Dust of One Summer
by MagicSwede1965
Summary: An island family works out kinks in their relationships during a turbulent vacation.  Follows 'The Face That Launched a Leaky Rowboat'
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** _A thousand apologies for my long absence! My only excuse is that this story took me three months to write, and I had just a few too many distractions, so that the muse sneaked away from me. I finally finished it on December 16 and here it comes…a summer story, just in time for Christmas. (ha ha) Oh well, enjoy anyway…_

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><p>§ § § - August 11, 2007<p>

Michiko Tokita Bartolomé, queen of Arcolos, wearing a well-aged Fantasy Island High School T-shirt and a pair of turquoise denim short-shorts with a few holes in them, knelt in her mother's garden tugging a carrot out of the ground. Her daughter Catalina, going on six, crouched beside her, gingerly balancing herself on the balls of her feet while using Michiko's thigh for support. "That's a carrot?" she asked.

"It certainly is," said Michiko, grinning at her.

"It's dirty," Catalina announced, wrinkling her nose.

"All vegetables are dirty when they come out of the ground," Michiko told her, dropping the carrot in a large basket nearby and reaching for another. "We wash them before we cook them in anything, I promise."

"I hope so," the little girl mumbled, watching Michiko pull up the next one. "I'd never want to eat any dirt. But _Madi_…why doesn't _Grendé-Madi_ have a greenhouse like at home?"

Simultaneously amused and saddened, Michiko laid the latest carrot in the basket and turned her full attention on the child. "Catalina, listen: very few people live in the kind of palace we do. Usually only other royalty does. My mother grew up orphaned and very poor in Japan, and she learned to grow her own vegetables and any other food she possibly could. She did it in a patch of dirt very much like this, and let the sun shine right on the plants and watered them herself from a pitcher. And she did this even after she met my father and married him, and had me and my brothers and sisters. We always helped my mother in her garden, and we all grew up eating home-grown vegetables just like this."

Catalina stared wide-eyed at her. _"Grendé-Madi_ was orphaned?"

Michiko nodded. "That's right," she said quizzically.

"Then maybe Mr. Roarke could help her find out about her family," the child said brightly. "She could know who her mother and father were and if she ever had brothers and sisters, like you and _Papi_ do."

Michiko had to smile. "I don't think Mother really wants to know," she mused, reaching for another carrot. "She was very happy with my father. And she's gone this long without trying to find her family; if she really wanted to know, she would have tried it a long time ago. I don't think it's very important to her."

Catalina made an incredulous noise, but fell silent a moment or two, watching Michiko hoist the last few carrots out of the soil, shake off the worst of the dirt and let them fall into the basket. Then there was a shout from some little distance, and Catalina leaped to her feet. _"Madi,_ they're here! I can hear them!" She raced around the side of the house and was gone in an instant.

Michiko stared after her for a moment, wondering what she meant; then she remembered and sighed to herself. Her brother Hachiro, his wife Lani, and their large family were supposed to arrive today and would be staying till the end of the month. She wasn't sure if this was Hachiro's decision, or something Lani had pushed him into; but she did feel it was a good thing they were here. Hachiro had spent far too much time away from the family, and it was past time he reconnected. She pushed herself to her feet, grabbed the basket handle and brushed off her knees and shins before returning to the house via the back door.

She was busy washing the carrots and other vegetables in the sink when one member of the noisy mob migrated from the front entry to the kitchen. "Michiko, there you are," exclaimed Lani Tokita, hugging her from behind without waiting even long enough for the laughing queen to dry her hands. "Gosh, it's great to see you again. It's been too long."

"Much too long," Michiko agreed, snagging a towel and wiping her hands with it. "Hi there, Lani, are you surviving the summer?"

"So far so good," Lani quipped with a wink. "Actually, you'd be surprised—the boys keep each other pretty busy, and I really have to worry only about Tyler and Olivia. Griffen turns four soon, so he's decided he's graduated to hanging out with his older brothers now." They both laughed. "You're looking good."

"I've had a good summer," Michiko said with a smile. "It's done me a lot of good to be here at home. In some ways I don't want to go back to Arcolos, in other ways I can't wait to head out. I miss Errico and the kids, and anyway, I want to be there to see Paolono finally get married to Lindalia."

"Whoa…the heir to the throne's tying the knot? I didn't hear about this," Lani exclaimed with quickening interest.

"It's not common knowledge yet," Michiko said. "Errico told me just this morning—he says Paolono proposed a couple of days ago and came to him yesterday to get formal permission. Which was just a matter of outdated protocol, since almost the whole world knows Errico's dying to get his sons married off. The wedding's been set for next spring."

"Wow," murmured Lani, looking wistful. "Just once I'd love to see a royal wedding in person. I remember watching Charles and Diana get married on TV when I was a kid."

"Then we'll be sure to invite you," Michiko offered. "Let Hachiro deal with the boys and Olivia by himself for a while, and he'll see what you go through every day."

Lani released a bark of laughter. "Oh, that'd be suicidal. I'd probably come back and find the house burned down." They both laughed again. "But let's put it this way, I'm not turning it down outright. So…why don't you come out and say hi to the gang."

Michiko followed her out to the entry, where her five boisterous young nephews and excited little niece were being introduced to a thoroughly delighted Miyoshi; Lani's sons from her first marriage, Aaron and Ephraim, stood slightly apart, watching. Aaron, always an easygoing boy, was smiling a little, but Ephraim wore his characteristic scowl and had his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his baggy, knee-length jean shorts.

Hachiro finished introducing Tyler, the youngest boy at two and a half, and lifted the little girl, Olivia, so that Miyoshi could take her. In Japanese he introduced her, then said to Olivia in English, "And this is _Oba-chan."_ He pronounced the Japanese word slowly and carefully. "Can you say that? _Oba-chan."_

Michiko did a quick estimate in her head and realized Olivia might have some trouble pronouncing the word, at about twenty months or so. "It's okay if she can't say it."

"I'm sure Mama-san would like to hear it, though," Hachiro said and peered at the little girl. "Say _Oba-chan?"_

"Oba-tawn," Olivia finally parroted, looking at her father instead of her grandmother, which made everyone laugh except for Ephraim. Miyoshi giggled, sounding almost like her little granddaughter, and gently bounced the child.

Lani leaned a little nervously to Michiko. "Does your mother speak English?"

"She can speak enough to get by, but she's much more comfortable with Japanese," Michiko said. "But she doesn't mind using English for your benefit. She wants to be able to communicate with her grandchildren."

Lani nodded, looking a little more at ease, then cleared her throat. "Listen, I was hoping we could sit down and talk a little while—just you and me by ourselves. I haven't really had anyone to unload on."

Michiko studied her sister-in-law and nodded back. "All right, just say when."

"Is now a bad time?" Lani wondered.

"Well, no." Michiko's eyes widened with surprise. "I guess it's just that you just got here and I thought you'd want to relax a little."

Lani scoffed lightly, "Oh, the trip wasn't that long. Just let me know where a good private spot would be."

Michiko made a quick excuse to her mother, who barely seemed to notice in her joy over Hachiro's kids, and led Lani down to the same rumpus room where they had talked with Myeko a couple of years before at the massive family reunion. "This is usually the best place to get some privacy. There should be some beverages back here…" She went to the small wet bar in one corner and pulled open the miniature refrigerator tucked under the cabinet. "We've got about five different kinds of soda, and there's what's left of a jar of sun tea in here. And it looks like Mama-san mixed up some lemonade for Catalina."

"I'll have a soda, any kind," Lani decided, and Michiko extracted two cans and pushed the door shut with one foot, coming to join her on the long sofa that pulled out into a bed. It was here that Aaron and Ephraim would be sleeping; the other boys would share Saburo's old room, using sleeping bags and extra pillows, while Olivia stayed in Hachiro's old room with him and Lani.

Lani popped the top and drank deeply. "Ahhh," she sighed, finally lowering the can, "that hit the spot. It might not have been a long flight, but I sure got thirsty." Michiko chuckled in acknowledgement. "Well." Lani shifted in her seat, one knee bent atop the cushion, so that she faced Michiko. "I'm sure you know all about Hachiro coming here back in May, and why."

Michiko made an affirmative noise, wondering why Lani had chosen to bring this up three months later. As far as she knew, Hachiro and Leslie had forged a friendship, albeit a tentative one, and she had had no indication that anything was other than all right.

Lani nodded and gulped down some more from the can. "I'm sure you know it was a pretty sizable shock to me, to realize he had this crush on your friend all this time, even though he's always said he loves me."

Michiko tilted her head at Lani. "Are you one of those people who think you can be in love with only one person at a time?"

"Well…I don't know about that. I can't say anything about it," Lani admitted, her face turning pink. "I've never had it happen to me, but I know some people who have, so I guess it's possible. I just…it's just that it really bugs me to know that what he felt for your friend never really died. And—well, this is the crux of the problem for me. If he's felt that way about her since high school—I mean, come on, it's, like, thirty years!—who says he'll ever stop feeling like that, even though he's said he's trying to?"

Michiko drew in a deep breath; she had wanted to talk to Leslie about this, but had been afraid to bring it up, unsure of Leslie's reaction. "Lani, have you really talked to Hachiro about this? I mean, since he came back from talking to Leslie?"

Looking caught out, Lani reluctantly shook her head. "No. But I'm not sure I want to. I think I'd be afraid to hear the plain, brutal truth." She sat up. "You were still here when he came back and spoke with her. What'd he say?"

"I don't know, and I haven't asked Leslie any more than I asked Hachiro. That's just between them, and I won't hear anything about it unless Leslie decides to tell me. Hachiro certainly won't." Michiko smiled wryly and Lani mirrored it, rolling her eyes.

"Maybe I'm being neurotic," Lani muttered, "but…I just want to understand it."

"Some things defy understanding," Michiko remarked, sipping from her soda can.

Lani nodded. "I know. But it's eating me alive, Michiko. I just want…" She hesitated a moment, staring into the can, then met her sister-in-law's gaze. "I've never met her. I'd like to, just to see what it is Hachiro's so hung up on."

Michiko frowned. "Lani, I don't want to start anything, but I think I need to explain something to you. Leslie isn't out to take Hachiro away from you. They were nothing but antagonistic toward each other for years and years, and if she can bring herself to treat my brother with civility, then I admire her for that. Let me set the matter straight: whatever feelings there are here, they're one hundred percent Hachiro's. Leslie's married, she's crazy in love with Christian, and I'd be surprised if she was really interested in maintaining an ongoing friendship with Hachiro even after they got back on speaking terms. If you're going to take out your upset feelings on anybody, it better be Hachiro."

Lani blinked, looking startled. "Whoa. Well, I guess you told me."

"I'm sorry," Michiko said earnestly, consciously relaxing. "But I don't want to see Leslie being unfairly blamed for whatever Hachiro feels about her. She never wanted his attention and she still doesn't, even less so now because of her husband and family whom she loves dearly. Leslie and I have been very close friends since we first met in the eighth grade, and the way Hachiro treated her through our school years always made me so mad that I'd side with her. If I do introduce you to her, I just want you to remember that she isn't the least bit interested in Hachiro."

Lani nodded. "Okay, okay. Hachiro said pretty much the same thing, that he knew she never returned his feelings and she was never going to. What I'm upset about is that he still has those feelings." She raised her soda can at Michiko when the latter began to speak. "No, don't try to defend him. He's had them so long, I'm sure they haven't disappeared only three months after he made nice with her."

"Then tell me this," Michiko said. "Since you're convinced Hachiro still has a crush on Leslie, have you talked about it with him since he, uh, 'made nice'?"

"Why bother?" Lani said irritably. "It's like panning for gold in the Sargasso Sea to get him to talk to me about anything other than everyday crap. Maybe worse. I could probably get more gold out of the ocean than words out of Hachiro."

Coolly Michiko remarked, "Well, then, if you refuse to even try to talk to him about it, you don't have any right to be annoyed about whatever feelings you think he has."

Lani's face acquired a heavy brick-red hue and she let her head fall forward. "I guess I don't," she muttered. "You're the first one to have the guts to say that to me." She looked up, a little warily. "Look, I know you've told me your friend isn't to blame, but I'd still like to meet her first. To ease my mind."

Michiko let her stew a minute while she took another drink from the can; she wasn't crazy about Lani's attitude, and thought she might make a stab at encouraging Hachiro to talk to his wife and try to ease her suspicions. After a moment she said, "Well, I could do that, but not today—Mr. Roarke and Leslie are in the middle of their business this weekend, so she probably won't have any time to get away unless we go to the luau and see her there. I really don't think she needs to spend all weekend laboring under the idea that you think it's her fault Hachiro feels the way he does."

Lani scowled. "I'm not going to _blame_ her for anything! I just want to meet her!"

"Calm down," Michiko said a little forcefully. "I realize you're under stress, but you're handling it all wrong. For the sake of your marriage, you'd better talk to Hachiro, and do it soon. If you let it fester like this, you two may very well end up divorced, whether you want it that way or not."

Lani made a noise and stared out the door leading into the backyard; Michiko waited, but Lani said nothing else, and finally she got up to leave. "I'll leave you alone to think about it," she said quietly and returned to the kitchen to continue washing the vegetables.

She found Hachiro in there talking with their mother; they looked up and smiled when they saw her. "Come and sit down," Miyoshi offered.

Thinking to tell Hachiro about Lani, she sat, but he spoke first. "We've just been talking about what Mama-san should do with this house."

"I know you want to sell it," Michiko began slowly, "but…"

Miyoshi smiled knowingly. "I have heard protests from all sides," she said in a gentle voice, speaking Japanese as she did within the family. "I owe no money on it, and it is no great expense to me. It's simply too large for me to keep up when I live here alone."

"Isn't it possible to pass it along to one of us?" Hachiro persisted, reminding Michiko of a conversation they'd had in May. "You wouldn't even have to leave it then."

"None of you would take it," Miyoshi said, her voice still gentle, warming the words with a wistful little smile. "You have your life in Hawaii, Michiko and Reiko both live in Arcolos, Kiichiro and Kayoko have their own home on this island, and Saburo and Kalani have no need of a house this large. Their children are all grown and have homes of their own. And your children and Reiko's are still young."

Michiko felt inexplicably out of sorts. "And I'm sure you wouldn't come back to the island," she muttered at Hachiro.

He stared at her. "What's your problem?" he asked, reverting to English.

Michiko used the same tongue. "Lani," she said shortly. "When you came here three months ago to straighten things out with Leslie, did you ever tell Lani what happened? Did you and she ever really sit down and talk about it after you went back home?"

"I told her what happened," Hachiro said warily while their mother listened, "and she said she understood. I figured the matter was closed."

"Then either she's had a lot of time to think about it and second-guess her initial answer, or she outright lied. It's been bothering her. She just talked to me about it downstairs. She thinks you're still in love with Leslie and that you always will be, because you have been for so long now. If you two don't get this out in the open, Hachiro, she'll find some way to use it against you and drive a wedge between you two. Unless you want a second divorce under your belt, you'd better clear the air with her."

Hachiro looked as if she'd taken a sledgehammer to his knees. For a full minute he sat there and gaped at her. At last Miyoshi filled in the breach. "Hachiro, I want you to tell me the truth," she said in an unusually stern voice. "Are you still in love with Leslie?"

Hachiro visibly squirmed, reminding Michiko of Catalina when she was in trouble with Errico, and opened his mouth, but said nothing. Looking helpless, he gave his mother a desperate glance and admitted, "Well, maybe some."

"Is that the truth?" Miyoshi persisted.

He threw his hands in the air, exasperated. "Look," he snapped, "I've said it before—I don't have a magic switch to shut off that crush, okay? I've been working on it, and going over what Leslie told me, and making myself understand that I've got a damn good situation here with Lani and the kids, and I'd be the ultimate in stupid if I threw all that away. Why doesn't anybody just try putting themselves in my shoes, just once, and try to figure out what they'd do in my place? Instead, I get excoriated to within an inch of my life, and my own wife thinks I'll betray her at the drop of a hat. I suppose the whole lot of you are waiting for me to live down to your lousy expectations of me." He shoved his chair back and arose, apparently unaware of Michiko's and Miyoshi's startled stares. They both recoiled when he opened his mouth and raised his already loud voice to shout, "There, Lani, I hope you heard all that! Go ahead and leave me if you're so sure I'm about to walk out on you!" He didn't wait for a response from anyone but slammed out the back door and jogged across the backyard, ignoring the kids playing there.

Michiko blinked at her mother, who sighed gently and wrapped her hands around her teacup. In Japanese she murmured, "I fear we pushed him much too far."

"Where do you think he's going?" Michiko asked.

Miyoshi shook her head. "He has done that for many years, I'm sure you remember, Michiko-chan. He needs to be alone for a time, and perhaps now that I look back, we all pushed him too far, too often. It's best if we let him be."

Lani appeared in the doorway then, looking astonished. "What was that all about?"

"Hachiro just stormed out the door under the impression that no matter what he does, he's going to lose you before your vacation's over," Michiko said in a flat tone.

"Oh," Lani said, startled.

In her careful English, Miyoshi addressed Lani with a gentle smile. "Come and sit, Lani. You have not spoken to Hachiro? Is difficult for him. He tries so hard, but maybe he feels no one believes him. And now he need that."

Lani went brilliant scarlet again and dropped her head into her hands. "I feel like I can't do anything right. I'm jealous of the way he feels about Leslie Hamilton, or whatever her name is now. I'm jealous because he never talks to me, so I don't know how he really feels, and all I can think is that if Leslie'd let him, he'd probably gab his head off at her. I hate feeling this way, but I can't help it."

"Hachiro always quiet," Miyoshi reflected. "Not easy for him to speak about feelings."

Michiko ventured, "I think Hachiro always felt a bit lost within the family. Saburo knew what to expect, being the oldest child and the oldest son as well. And Mama-san, we girls knew you and Papa-san wanted us to be dutiful daughters, to be good people and to make good marriages and be good mothers. But there were no clear-cut expectations of Hachiro, and he kind of ran wild."

Miyoshi regarded her with some surprise, as if impressed by her view. Then a sadness filled her black eyes and she murmured, "Perhaps Masato and I spoiled him."

"Maybe just a little, Mama-san," Michiko said with a forgiving little smile, reaching across the table to take her mother's hand. "You know, though…I think maybe he's tried hard to grow up, all on his own, without much guidance and without asking us for any, because he probably felt we'd only look at him with censorious eyes and criticize him."

Lani's face went from red to white. "And I've been pushing him too," she exclaimed in horrified realization. "I've spent the whole summer being cool to him. Sometimes I've given him the cold shoulder. I just couldn't get over the idea that he still loves Leslie."

"You should be telling him all this," Michiko said, gentling her voice, trying to tamp down her lingering annoyance with her stubborn sister-in-law.

"I would if I knew where he was going," Lani said.

Miyoshi wrapped her free hand around Lani's. "We wait for him to come back," she said, "and then you tell him. Is best if you do. For sake of your children."


	2. Chapter 2

§ § § - August 11, 2007

Hachiro, naturally unaware of what was happening at home, loped down a trail at a ground-eating pace till he had burned off just enough anger to think about what he wanted to do next. He considered, then dismissed, the idea of seeking out Leslie; it was exactly what Lani expected him to do, and he wasn't going to sink to that. He thought about talking to Roarke, but discarded that idea just as quickly. He had never been comfortable around Roarke, no matter how much his sister and her friends sang his praises and chattered about how easy he was to trust. To tell the complete truth, he'd never really been one to go babbling to other people; he preferred to work things out on his own. Yet for some reason, this time he just needed a sympathetic ear. Not so much someone to suggest solutions, just a fellow henpecked husband to commiserate with.

For the first time in a great many years, he found himself thinking of his high-school friends, whom he hadn't seen since…well, since graduation. He'd never bothered coming back for the reunions and had pretty much fallen out of touch with everybody. He'd heard over the years, though, mostly thanks to his parents, that the guys had all eventually married and had kids, and those who were natives of the island were all still here. He considered a couple of names, then shook his head and smiled faintly. Caleb Kohala had always been a rabble-rouser; in fact he'd sometimes crossed the line into bullying. Hachiro was a bit chagrined to remember it now; at the time he'd figured it was just some harmless fun, but he wondered now who might still bear scars from what he and Caleb and several other guys used to consider light teasing. He could think of a couple of times when Kohala had chosen Leslie as his target, which had decided him never to reveal the secret of his crush on Leslie to Caleb. He'd also tried not to be around when Caleb taunted Leslie; but he knew deep inside that it had made little difference to Leslie, since Hachiro had taunted her enough on his own. He sighed and made his way to the Ring Road, where he flopped onto a bench and waited a little more than ten minutes till a shuttle bus lumbered into view and he boarded.

He stayed on till the bus reached the one stop that served the fishing village; he'd heard that Caleb still lived around here. He asked a few people, till one finally pointed him to a small one-story house with faded clapboard siding. The patch of yard surrounding it was weedy, but there was a gleaming outrigger leaning against the sagging picket fence, and Hachiro could see a large and well-tended vegetable garden along the foundation. He thudded the door with his fist. "Yo, Kohala, anybody home?"

Children's shouts rose from inside, and he heard a woman's voice shushing them. The door flew open and Hachiro found himself peering at a boy around ten or eleven years old, with almost identical facial features to Caleb. "Hi," the kid said questioningly.

"Hi, is your dad home?" Hachiro asked.

"Yeah, he's lookin' for some more wax to keep workin' on his outrigger," the boy said. "Who're you?"

"Just say his friend Tokita's here," Hachiro said.

The boy shrugged. "Okay." Leaving the door standing open, he trotted back a dozen or so steps and hollered toward some back room, "Hey Dad, your friend Tokita's here!"

Hachiro heard a voice respond, and a minute or so later, Caleb Kohala appeared in the entry hall. "Hey, he wasn't kidding!" he exclaimed, his face lighting with amazement when he beheld Hachiro standing on the stoop. "Man, it's good to see ya—c'mon in!" He shot the boy, who was lingering, a look. "Get in the kitchen and bring out a coupla beers."

"Okay," the boy agreed and disappeared. Caleb came out and whacked Hachiro in the shoulder, grinning broadly and ushering him into a tiny, cramped living room dominated to an overwhelming degree by an enormous plasma television screen, which swallowed an entire wall and looked absurdly out of place among the worn furniture.

"Wow," Hachiro said, "when'd you get that?"

"Been saving for that for years," Caleb said proudly. "So…siddown anyplace. Where've you been all these years? Me and the guys keep tellin' each other, y'know, it's just not the same without ol' Tokita in the gang."

Hachiro shrugged, beginning to relax. "Aw, well, I've been around. Living in Hawaii right now…got a nice house there, good job, decent boss—you know Tom Ichino? I've been working for him the last thirteen, fourteen years."

"Yeah, I remember him…year ahead of us, wasn't he? Heard he made a real name for himself." The boy came in with a couple of bottles of some Chinese beer Hachiro had never heard of, and handed them both to Caleb, who shook his head. "They're not both for me, Hunter. Give him one." The boy presented Hachiro with a bottle, and as Hachiro thanked him, Caleb went on, "This's my boy, Hunter—gonna turn ten New Year's Eve. Got three girls too, oldest one's about to start college. You got any kids?"

"Hey, Hunter might like to meet my son Liam," Hachiro remarked. "He turns ten next April. Yeah, matter of fact, I've got eight kids and a couple stepsons."

Caleb's mouth yawned open and he let out a roar of laughter. "Man, you sure been busy, huh? As my wife says, don'tcha know what causes that?"

Hachiro laughed too. "Yeah, well…I grew up in a big family and I always wanted one of my own. My first wife was Myeko Sensei—you might remember her…"

Caleb nodded and hooted again. "Yeah, she was always mooning around after you, the way I remember it. Finally got suckered in, huh?"

Hachiro made a neutral noise. "We had two kids together, a boy and a girl, and then we got divorced. Married Lani after I moved to Hawaii, and she has two sons from her first marriage to a shark of a lawyer. And we've got six together, five boys and a girl."

Caleb sat there thinking; Hachiro could practically see cogs grinding in his friend's brain. Caleb had never been especially bright; he'd needed tutoring to graduate from high school with the rest of them. "Uh," Caleb grunted eventually, "so that means you got six boys and two girls, not countin' the stepsons, huh? Not half bad. Took us four tries to get Hunter here, and then Darla called a halt. She said she wanted to be young enough to enjoy life a little by the time the youngest moved out, so Hunter's the last one for us."

"Can't say as I blame her," Hachiro agreed, popping the top from his beer and taking a sip. It wasn't bad, to his surprise. "Lani didn't mind having the big family, but we thought we were gonna have three of each, see. But when the fourth boy was born, we got a little carried away, and by the time we finally got a girl, she was ready to quit."

"Yeah, women get a little tired of bein' pregnant, I guess," Caleb remarked with a snicker. "No wonder, I can see why—Darla spent every day tossin' cookies through all four of hers. Got a little disgusting after a while. So." He settled back, watching Hunter page through a manga comic. "Whatcha doin' back on the island?"

Hachiro filled Caleb in on the death of his father and the reunion that had followed, outlined the problem with selling the family home, and then hesitated a moment. "Say, uh, Caleb…mind if we find someplace to talk in private? I've, uh, got something on my chest."

Caleb rose immediately. "Yeah, outside. I was just looking for my wax to finish up my outrigger out there. If I can figure out where it is, we can both shine it up, and you can talk. Bring your brew."

A few minutes later they were both standing at the edge of the yard, each with a rag, rubbing wax on the polished wood. Hachiro sighed, realizing he was going to have to reveal the secret he'd kept for so many years. "You mentioned how Myeko used to moon over me. Well, fact is, I never told you and the guys, but I had a thing for Leslie Hamilton."

Caleb stopped and stared at him. "You did? You serious, Tokita?"

"Totally," Hachiro assured him. "Not that she ever returned it. Matter of fact, she hated my guts, and she never made any secret of it." He registered Caleb's astounded look, then decided to go out on a limb. "That's why I wouldn't join in when you made fun of her. It bugged me." _What for, stupid?_ his conscience butted in unexpectedly. _You thought picking on Leslie was your exclusive right or something?_

Caleb had enough grace to flush and let his head fall forward. "Yeah, well, we were all young and stupid, weren't we? Didn't have a real clue how to treat a girl, I guess. Man, I still remember one time, our senior year, I was workin' over at the pineapple plantation and she showed up with Tattoo. I think there was some rumor going around the island about Mr. Roarke, I forget what…" His voice trailed off as he thought back; then he nodded. "Yeah, that was it. People were saying he'd had an affair and now this woman had come back and was dumping her kid on him, saying it was his. We thought that was a good one…he goes and takes in Leslie, and then he's got his real kid here, and what's he gonna do with her?" He flicked an uneasy glance at Hachiro. "Anyway, me and a bunch of guys were havin' some lunch, and in she comes with Tattoo, and we were razzin' her pretty good. Tattoo told us off and hauled her out. I still remember her face." His voice slowed and became reflective and a little shamed. "She was white as a ghost. I guess we really hit a nerve."

Hachiro had only a vague memory of Michiko's telling the family at supper one Saturday evening about a nasty rumor being circulated about Roarke, which Leslie had debunked for Michiko and a couple of other girls. Michiko had made it plain that she believed Leslie's explanation, and by the end of the weekend she'd been proven right. But he couldn't recall what he'd been doing that weekend—certainly not working at the pineapple plantation, though. He had to push down a smug feeling of self-righteousness. "Well, it wasn't like her history was any secret. Everybody knew she was an orphan with no place else to go. She must've thought that rumor was true for a while herself."

Caleb shrugged. "Maybe. So…" He cleared his throat noisily, rubbing energetically at the same spot on the side of the canoe till a good five minutes had passed. Hachiro let them go, sensing he'd have a real problem if he took issue with Caleb's antics all these years later; he needed a friend right now. "Anyway," Caleb finally went on, his voice oddly subdued, "what about Leslie? You ever see her? She's really lookin' good…did damn well for herself, too, marryin' that prince and workin' for Roarke."

"Uh, well…" Hachiro heaved an enormous sigh; it was all going to have to come out, like it or not. "Listen, Caleb, before I tell you this, I need your word it goes no further than you and me, okay?"

"You got it," Caleb said, with such solemnity that Hachiro almost felt eager to talk. Before he could lose his nerve, he went ahead and explained everything: his ongoing crush on Leslie, his shock when she married and left the island, his eventual engagement to Myeko, Leslie's return as a widow, his life with Myeko, the divorce…even his ill-advised attempt to make Leslie return at least some of his feelings for her. He left nothing out, confessing to having seized Tommy Ichino's job offer primarily so he could get off the island and away from the possibility of seeing Leslie every day.

Caleb nodded, wordless throughout, till Hachiro trailed off and tilted back the beer bottle to wet his throat. "Huh. So you still got a crush on Leslie? I thought you remarried."

"I did," Hachiro said. "And we've been really happy—at least till recently. Then my father passed, and like it or not, I had to come back. I spent the shortest time possible here and went home as soon as I could. It was convenient for me to say I had to work and the boys had school…but I just didn't want to take the chance of seeing Leslie."

Caleb looked thoroughly confused. "How come? I mean, you're married, she's married, and high school was years and years ago. She still holdin' a grudge?"

"She'd have a right," said Hachiro with a half-shrug. "And I think she did hold that grudge. She has a really long memory, from what I get."

Caleb grinned. "Sure sounds that way. So then what?"

Hachiro told him about Lani finally finding out the true reason he so seldom came back to Fantasy Island and laying out her ultimatum, and very briefly summarized his meeting with Leslie and their finally patching things up, even forging what looked like the beginning of a friendship. "But you never know," Hachiro admitted, reflecting for a moment. "I haven't seen her since then, so I'm not sure how close she'll stick to it." He grinned wryly. "Course, I just got here this morning and I'll be here a couple weeks."

"Yeah," Caleb agreed, absently running the waxing cloth along the outrigger pole on his side. "What about Lani?"

"She thinks I'm still in love with Leslie. I dunno, maybe I am a little bit, but I love Lani, man, you gotta believe it. I said to my sister, it's not like I have some magic switch I can use to just shut off my emotions. But Lani's blown the whole thing way out of proportion, and I'm worried she's gonna use this as an excuse to leave me."

"So you love Lani more than Leslie, right?" Caleb prodded. At Hachiro's nod, he said, "Then just tell her that."

"She doesn't believe it. I don't know what it'll take. I've done everything in my power for years to steer clear of Leslie Hamilton, y'know? I did it because I knew what might happen if I didn't. I had a commitment to Lani and our kids, and I didn't want to go off chasing some stupid one-sided crush. Seeing Leslie all the time would've probably tempted the heck out of me, and I wasn't willing to risk it. But she doesn't see that, man. All she can focus on is that I've had this crush for all these years. She really doesn't seem to think very much of me, if she figures all it takes is one look and I'll go running."

"So whatcha gonna do?" Caleb inquired with interest.

Hachiro shrugged helplessly. "No idea, man. All I know is, I'm probably not gonna be welcome in the same bed with my wife tonight. Say, you happen to have a spare cot or sofa I could bunk on, just for tonight? Just so I can give Lani some time to think?"

"Hey, man, we're still buds, aren't we? You bet. We'll just throw an extra coupla fish in the pot, or whatever Darla's brewin' up in the kitchen. I'd've invited you anyway—it's been too long since I saw ya, and we've got some catchin' up to do, so stick around and stay over. We got extra sheets and pillows, so we'll fix up the couch for ya."

Hachiro beamed, relieved at last. "Thanks, Kohala. Glad I showed up, it's been really good seein' ya." He realized he was falling into the cadence of their youth, but he didn't care; sometimes nostalgia felt good. He even suggested that he and Caleb grill out back to save Caleb's wife the trouble of cooking; that was how good he felt.

‡ ‡ ‡

"So is Hachiro back yet?" asked Aaron Crocker, poking his head in the back door to address Miyoshi, Michiko and Lani, all of whom were collaborating in the preparation of a large and rather complicated-looking Japanese meal.

The three women looked around at him in surprise, then at each other, and then at the clock, as if choreographed. "No, he isn't," Lani realized, frowning. "Why?"

Aaron looked surprised. "The kids wanted to get up a baseball game and have him be the umpire," he said.

"All of them?" Lani asked hopefully.

"Well, everybody except Eph," said Aaron with an accepting shrug.

At that point nine-year-old Liam stuck his head in the door. "Hi, Mom. Hey, Aaron, what's taking you so long?"

"Just checking with Mom on where your dad is," Aaron said.

"Mom, can you tell Eph he can't play?" Liam pleaded. "If we can get up a game, it'll be a lot better without him. He cheats."

Lani smiled wryly. "I can't ban him from playing. You can go on ahead and play if you want. Ask Ephraim and let him decide for himself."

"I want somebody who won't cheat," Liam protested.

Michiko spoke up then. "Myeko and her family are planning a backyard cookout this evening, and they have kids. I can call and see if they're there yet. I know she was planning to bring Alexander and Noelle over."

"We don't need any girl on our team," Liam announced. "But Alexander'd be awesome to have playing for us."

"Girls can play baseball too," Aaron informed him mildly, making Liam stare at him with the skepticism of a kindergartner newly informed that the moon is made of rock rather than green cheese. "Thanks, Aunt Michiko, that'd be great."

"Girls are lousy at baseball," Liam said as Aaron shooed him out the door, and they could hear Aaron rebutting this statement as the boys' voices drifted out of hearing. Lani snorted, and Michiko and Miyoshi both smiled.

"Where does he get that attitude?" Lani muttered in disgust. "Sometimes I think my guardian angel has an overdeveloped sense of sarcasm. I grew up in a women's-lib family, and now I have almost nothing but boys who think girls are inferior. Did you ever notice how we have to outperform the guys to get even grudging admittance that, hey, we might just have some use after all, other than cooking, cleaning and diapering?"

"I have," Michiko said, amused. "We still have a long way to go in this man's world. But the best you can do is try to raise the boys to realize that girls aren't inferior merely because they're girls."

Miyoshi's black eyes had an impish twinkle in them. "If okay with you," she said to Lani, "I start teach your boys to cook a little. Begin with Aaron, yes? Hachiro say to me that Aaron is leader. Anything Aaron do, his brothers will also do."

Lani began to light up. "Hey, you know, that's true. I'll get him in here."

Michiko laughed and went to the phone. "I'll check with Myeko about the kids."

She dialed the Okada house and waited through the rings while Lani went to the back door and called Aaron inside; after she got no response at the Okada home, she hung up and called the Sensei house. This time she got a reply and had to turn her attention from Miyoshi explaining to Aaron what was going into her stew. "Hi, Mrs. Sensei, is Myeko there yet? This is Michiko—I had something I wanted to ask her."

Junko Sensei agreed to have Myeko come to the phone, and a minute later Michiko was explaining her reason for calling. "Noelle can come over if she wants to," she added, "and if they feel like bringing Dawn, that's fine too. Cat's out back with Olivia and they could play together."

Myeko laughed. "Noelle's going to feel more like a babysitter than anything else, but I'll tell her she owes her grandmother a visit. That'll quiet her down. We haven't even started preparing the food yet—Taro's kids are squealing for pizza delivery instead of burgers and hot dogs, and there's a big argument going on about that."

"In that case, why don't you come on over with the kids? Did Taro bring his new girlfriend, by the way?"

"Ivy? Nah, she had to go back to the mainland about two weeks ago. Taro's getting ready to ask Christian for vacation time so he can visit her at her place, but if he waits too long he'll have to farm out Stephanie, Noah and Tia, probably here to Mom and Dad's. He and Ivy got really chummy while she was here, but they didn't seem to settle on whether they were more than a summer romance."

"That's too bad—I'd hate to see Iriata spoil Taro for another chance at love. What about Tomi and Sayuri? Are they around?"

"Sayuri's practically fallen off the edge of the earth since she decided to move to Nagoya to be with her boyfriend, Ryo Nakashima. You know, he's that guy she met at the Valentine's party Mr. Roarke and Leslie threw, six months ago. We don't hear from her too much, but Dad loves getting calls from her and hearing her speak Japanese." Both women laughed, and Myeko went on, "As for Tomi, his wife had to go back to work last week, but he and his kids are here till the last weekend of the month. He has to go back early to get his classroom set up." Tomi Sensei was a middle-school teacher in Samoa.

"I see. Well, Tomi's kids are welcome too if they want to come over. Hachiro and Lani's boys are trying to get up a ballgame in the backyard, and there's some dissent about whether to allow girls to play."

"Ooh, don't tell Tomi's daughter that. Emiko loves baseball, and she can beat the pants off most of the boys she plays, according to Tomi."

"Yeah? How old is she?" Michiko asked with interest.

"She's the same age as Noelle, thirteen. They don't always agree on everything, but they're incredibly close cousins. Well, if you're sure your mother won't mind, I'll bring the kids over and let the others figure out what they want to do about supper. I've got half a mind to say the heck with it, and suggest the luau, so we can catch up with Leslie if she's there. We haven't seen her since Christian's birthday party."

"True," Michiko mused. "Well, keep us posted, and come on over."

She hung up and became aware of an earnest conversation between Miyoshi and Aaron. The tiny Japanese lady was gazing up at the boy, already a good head taller than she, explaining, "So you see how I put _nasu_ in pot, yes? _Nasu_, and _nameko_, and this…kind of potato…what you call?"

"Sweet potato," said Lani, sounding a touch distracted.

"I see it," Aaron said, peering into the shiny stockpot that held what must be two gallons of stew, Michiko estimated. "What do you call it?"

"_Unpen-jiru,"_ Miyoshi said, pronouncing it carefully.

Aaron repeated it, slowly and uncertainly. "What's that?"

"Also known as Temple Garden Chowder," Michiko provided with a smile, stepping over to join them. "You even put dandelion greens in it."

"Ah yes, _tanpopo_ also," Miyoshi added, reaching over to gather up a huge fistful of carefully chopped greens. Aaron's eyes went wide with amazement as he watched her scatter them over the top of the stew, dropping in handfuls till they were gone.

"Holy cow," Aaron said in genuine awe. "Where do you get all those? Do you go around all the yards on the island collecting them or something?"

Michiko and Lani laughed, but Miyoshi nodded solemnly, only the twinkle in her eye giving her away. "Spend all spring and summer asking islanders if I can pick their _tanpopo_. They are happy to see them go. Say they are only weeds. But they are tasty weeds." She winked, and this time Aaron laughed as well.

"Normally that goes into the autumn version of this chowder," Michiko put in, "but by then the dandelions are long gone and Mama-san prefers to use them fresh. Believe me, you won't know they're there—it's like eating salad greens in the stew. It probably won't be too long till it's ready, but Myeko's bringing her kids and her nieces and nephews over, so you might be able to get up that baseball game after all."

"Hey, that sounds great," Aaron said with enthusiasm. He leaned over and popped a kiss on the wrinkled cheek of a delighted Miyoshi. "The stew sounds delicious. We're all going to be hungry after the game, so don't expect any leftovers." He grinned at her and loped out the back door, calling out to his brothers as he left.

"Very nice boy," Miyoshi said with a broad smile.

"I've never had to worry about Aaron," Lani said. "He was always the easiest kid in the world to raise, and just as easygoing and bright as can be." She sighed. "It's Ephraim who gives me the headaches. He and Aaron are just polar opposites."

There was a knock on the door then and Michiko hurried down to let in Myeko and a group of children. "Hi, Aunt Michiko," Alexander and Noelle greeted in chorus.

"Hi, you two," Michiko said, cheerfully returning their hugs. "Everyone's out back, just go on around. Come on in, Myeko."

"I don't feel like playing baseball," Noelle said, sighing. "Come on, Emi, can't you just keep me company? Cat and Olivia are too little for me to do anything but babysit them."

Emiko, a pretty girl who reflected the Japanese ancestry of both parents—for Tomi had married a Japanese resident of Samoa—threw a wistful glance behind her. "Oh, Noelle, seriously. You know I'm gonna have to go out there and keep that Liam kid from turning into a male chauvinist pig."

"You told her what he said?" Michiko asked, laughing.

Myeko smirked. "Couldn't resist," she said. "Don't worry, Noelle, Emi and her family will be here another couple of weeks yet. Let her have her fun, and come see if your grandmother needs any help in the kitchen."

"Probably not, her chowder's just about done, but I'm sure she'll be more than happy to have Noelle help her make dessert. Come on, you two." Michiko ushered them in and watched the others run in a flock around the house to the backyard before closing the door.

Noelle smiled shyly at Miyoshi, who beamed back at her and winked, and Myeko and Michiko settled at the kitchen table. Lani and Myeko greeted each other, and Myeko took note of Lani's expression. "You okay?"

"Yeah…well, Hachiro's gone off somewhere, like he always seems to do." She peered at Myeko. "Did he do that when you were married to him?"

Myeko sighed enough to raise her shoulders and nodded thoughtfully. "Yeah, I seem to remember him taking some long walks. He'd be gone for hours and eventually come back looking like he hadn't figured anything out. It always took him a few days to work through a problem. Sometimes he never did."

Lani's expression took on a worried cast. "Oh boy."

"Don't worry about it," Myeko said. "He'll probably be back in time for supper. He always was before. How's the family?"

Conversation ebbed and flowed for a while, till Miyoshi deemed the stew was ready and was about to dispatch Noelle to call in the kids when Liam and Cody burst in the door, startling their half-sister. "Sorry," Liam said, catching sight of her. "Hi, Noelle. Mom, can you come out and make Ephraim stop? He's been throwing little rocks at us all the way through our game and says somebody's gonna break a window with the ball."

"He's cheating, too," Cody chimed in indignantly. "He decided he was gonna be the umpire, and he's making all the wrong calls. Out when we're safe, and strikes when it's fair, and inside the park when it's a homer…"

"And then says all _his_ hits and runs are homers," added Liam.

Lani rolled her eyes while Michiko and Myeko exchanged amused looks. Then Noelle said, "I thought the umpire wasn't supposed to play," which made them all grin.

Liam and Cody stared at her, then at each other. "Hey, she's right," Liam exclaimed. "He shouldn't even be playin'! Mom, can you be the umpire?"

"Where's Dad?" Cody wanted to know.

"He's gone someplace," Lani said. "You might as well stop the game. It looks like your grandmother's got the stew ready, so go out and have your brothers and cousins come in."

Myeko got to her feet. "I guess we'd better get back to my parents' place," she said. "Maybe by now they've figured out what we're going to eat. Come on, Noelle."

By the time Lani had finally gotten all her sons and Olivia into bed for the night, she was all but ready to call the police to start a search for Hachiro. "He's been gone way too long," she fretted, "and Myeko said he was always back for supper…"

Michiko peered at her watch; it was nearing nine-thirty. "I wouldn't worry about Hachiro if I were you. If something had happened to him, we'd have heard about it by now. But I do have an idea. I think most of his friends from high school stayed on the island. We could call around and see if he's with one of them."

"Do you think he is?" Lani asked, clearly astounded by the idea. "I mean…I thought he wasn't in touch with any of his friends. It's not like he ever made time for any high-school reunions or anything."

Michiko laughed. "It couldn't hurt to try. I can't remember the names of most of his friends, but I do recall a couple."


	3. Chapter 3

§ § § - August 12, 2007

Hachiro had never returned the entire night, and he hadn't been with either of the two friends Michiko recalled him having had in school. Lani was beside herself with both worry and anger. "I'm going to skewer him if he ever comes back," she was vowing about an hour after breakfast, having helped Miyoshi and Michiko clean the kitchen and decide what to do about lunch later. "I can't believe he'd do this! Stayed out all night, never called, never told anybody where he was going. How irresponsible is that?"

At that moment the door opened and Hachiro came in, looking a little wary. Before anyone could speak, Lani lashed right into him, shrieking at him for having been out all night, not calling, making her worry, and several other transgressions. Hachiro stood in the entry hall with a resigned look on his face and waited her out till she had expended most of her outrage; then he looked at his mother and sister, who were reluctant witnesses to the whole thing. "So somebody missed me after all?" he muttered.

That left Lani speechless; her face was still red, but her mouth gaped open while she groped for something to say. Michiko looked curiously at him. "Where were you?"

"At Caleb Kohala's," he said.

"Oh! That's one of the ones I couldn't remember," she said, partly to Lani, partly to herself. "Well, you could at least have called us if you were planning to stay there."

Hachiro threw Lani a mocking look. "I'm amazed it mattered to anybody," he said derisively. "I'm sure Lani probably figured I was down at Leslie's place singing serenades under her bedroom window." With that, he headed to the lower level. Lani squeaked, her eyes enormous.

"Goodness, he's really in a mood," Michiko murmured, very surprised. Hachiro rarely gave voice to his feelings; he was clearly nearing the end of his rope, judging from the dis-gusted sarcasm in his tone.

"I can't stand it anymore," Lani bleated finally, and Michiko could see that her eyes had filled with tears. "I _can't._ Michiko, please, will you call and see if I can meet that woman? I have to know what it is about her."

Michiko hesitated, but Lani turned a pathetic gaze on her, and she finally gave in. "Okay," she said, "but remember what I said yesterday about blaming Leslie." She went into the kitchen and dialed the main house.

‡ ‡ ‡

In the study, Leslie was trying to quiet her children, pay some of the business bills, and sort out the latest batch of mail, all at the same time. "Come on, you guys, quit fighting," she entreated. "Mommy's too busy for this stuff right now." The phone rang and she groaned aloud. "Oh, blast it all. Hey, you three, that's enough!"

Her raised voice startled the triplets enough that they fell silent to stare at her, and she took advantage of the break, grabbing the phone. "Main house." She eyed the triplets in warning as she spoke.

"Leslie, are you free for a while? This is Michiko."

"Oh, hi," said Leslie, watching the children, who seemed more interested in her phone conversation at the moment than their squabble. "I guess I'm free. At least, I'm sitting here deskbound with a lot of paperwork. Father's out seeing to one of the fantasies."

"I see. Well, if it's all right with you, I'd like to bring someone over. She'd like to meet you if you don't mind."

"Okay, come on over," Leslie agreed. "I could use a break. I'm pretty well stuck here with the kids, since the Miyamotos are in Japan for Kazuo's mother's funeral…"

"That's right, I'd heard about that. It's a shame, I think Katsumi said she was the last grandparent her daughters had. We'll have to get together with her when they come back. Well, okay then, we'll be over in about fifteen minutes."

"Sounds good." Leslie hung up and shot the children one last look before daring to reach for the next bill. Then Tobias said loudly, "Dat's mine!" and shattered the fragile peace, so that by the time Michiko and her visitor arrived, Leslie was in the middle of planting each child in a separate chair and assigning time out.

"Uh-oh, are we interrupting something?" Michiko asked laughingly, stopping in the inner foyer.

Leslie looked around and smiled wryly. "Nothing I wouldn't want interrupted," she assured her friend. "Come on in and sit over here." She turned to the triplets while the two women came into the study. "Now I mean it—the three of you need to sit quietly till I tell you you can get up, do you understand?" They looked mutinous, and she prodded, "Tobias?" He nodded, his lower lip sticking out. "Susanna?" She nodded, with a nasty glance at her brother that Leslie decided she was better off ignoring. "Karina?" When Karina nodded, Leslie sighed and delivered one last "I mean it" before retreating behind Roarke's desk and facing her two visitors. "Well, hi there."

"Hi," Michiko said, grinning. "Sounds like your little angels' halos slipped."

Leslie had to laugh. "Yep, 'fraid so. Well, what can I do for you?"

"First of all, let me introduce Lani Tokita. She's my sister-in-law, Hachiro's wife."

"Oh." Leslie turned her attention to Lani, whose face seemed a little hostile, she thought. "Welcome to the island."

"Hi," said Lani guardedly.

Michiko cleared her throat. "Lani," she murmured in what sounded like warning.

Lani let her head fall back and blew out her breath. "Michiko, you're going to just have to forgive me later," she said with a tinge of exasperation in her voice, "but I really need to get this off my chest." She then turned to Leslie and asked directly, "What the hell hold is it you've got on my husband?"

Leslie stared at her, stunned for a moment, then groaned. "Oh, for fate's sake…I thought all this was behind us. What do you mean, 'hold'?"

"He's still obsessed with you. Oh, I know everybody keeps telling me he's not that into you and you never liked him and all that. But I know he still has feelings for you. I want to know what you did to him all those years ago that made him feel like that."

Leslie felt the burner go on under her temper, but tried to keep her voice calm. She had no interest in getting into a shouting match, for if she did, she knew she would lose track of what she wanted to say. "First of all, I want to ask you something. Do you really believe I have any feelings for Hachiro, outside of platonic friendship?"

"Everybody says you don't," Lani admitted.

"Well, that's something," Leslie murmured, meeting Michiko's apologetic look. "It's okay, Michiko, it's not your fault. Lani, I'm telling you the truth when I say that I have no interest in Hachiro. I'm married, and those three little troublemakers sitting over there are my children. Their father is Christian Enstad, a man I'm deeply in love with and always will be. Just in case you're not sure, here." She displayed her wedding ring at Lani.

"I know you're married to that prince and you've got kids by him," Lani said impatiently. "That isn't what I asked. I want to know why Hachiro still has feelings for you."

"Oh, Lani, for Pete's sake, how is Leslie supposed to know that?" Michiko demanded, unable to hold her tongue any longer. "I told you not to blame her for Hachiro's follies, but I don't think you heard a word I said."

Leslie stared at Lani, who threw Michiko a _stay out of this_ look and resumed glaring at her. "What kind of answer do you expect me to give you?" Leslie wanted to know. "Am I supposed to tell you that I can read his mind, therefore I know why?"

Lani blinked rapidly, looking flustered for the first time. "Well," she muttered, "I guess not. But…" She looked up again and squinted at Leslie as if searching for defects. "I'm just trying to figure out what he sees in you, what he's been seeing in you all these years."

At that point Leslie remembered her conversation with Hachiro in May and smiled to herself, now all too ready to throw Lani off balance. "He wanted me," she stated slowly and clearly, "because he couldn't have me."

She had to be very careful not to smile even more widely when Lani's mouth dropped open wide enough to run an oil pipeline through. It took a good thirty seconds for Leslie's words to sink in and for Lani's expression to flip through a number of small but obvious changes before the other woman sank back in her chair in slow motion. "Oh, so that's what it was," she breathed at last.

"Are you satisfied now?" Michiko asked in irritation. Leslie was surprised; she very seldom saw Michiko really angry. "You've got your answer, now maybe you can leave Leslie alone and work on getting through this thing with Hachiro, instead of fuming and letting it stew and fester so you can feel sorry for yourself?"

Lani had the grace to blush. "Okay, okay, you can stop," she mumbled. "But I really had to know." Again she looked at Leslie. "How'd you figure it out?"

"You're probably aware that Hachiro and I talked back in May," said Leslie, and waited for Lani's nod before she continued. "We really didn't know where to start, so we just sat down and kind of blundered through. The more we talked, the more insight we got, probably just as much on ourselves as on each other. Hachiro admitted that because of his position in the family, he was allowed to do more or less whatever he wanted, and it gave him a sense of entitlement as he was growing up. He wasn't used to being denied anything, and he was probably pretty shocked when I turned him down, the one time he asked me out. I had my own reasons for doing it, which I won't go into here. But he didn't take it well, and proceeded to punish me for it for the rest of our high-school years. By the time we'd both graduated, there was so much antagonism there that I couldn't even conceive of being friends with him, never mind anything more."

"Geez," Lani breathed, still looking astounded.

"I guess he just had a hard time getting over it," Leslie said. "But Lani, there's something you should know. Hachiro told me himself that when you figured out he still had some feelings for me, and you told him to do something about it or there'd be consequences, it scared him. He didn't want to lose you and the kids."

"Oh," said Lani, blinking again.

"Take that as a sign, Lani. He's in love with you. Okay, maybe he still has some love left over for me. But he's more in love with you than with me, and I know it, because if it weren't true, he wouldn't have cared so much about working through what's left of his emotions over me and putting things back together with you." She leaned forward and said earnestly, "Don't you realize that that's really why he never brought you and the boys back here unless somebody nagged him into it? He was afraid that proximity would sabotage his efforts to make his own life and let me make mine. He didn't want to be tempted all the time. He wanted like anything to make it all work out with you and your kids. Do you really think he'd care that much about succeeding with you, if he were that much in love with me?"

"I guess not," Lani said softly.

"Definitely not. I'd made it clear to him on several occasions that there was just no chance for us the way he used to hope there would be. The bottom line is, he's got too much invested in you and your children together, and he doesn't want to throw it all away on an impossible dream. There is no chance, Lani. No chance at all. I love Christian, and Hachiro loves you. That's the way it is, and even if you think Hachiro still cares for me…" She paused, then looked at Michiko and laughed. "This is probably going to crack you up," she said as Michiko began to grin back questioningly, "but the fact is, Hachiro's matured enough that he's got the willpower to resist temptation."

Michiko laughed. "It's cruel to think it's funny, but I think you're right anyway," she said, coughing away a guilty giggle. "No, it's true, Hachiro's grown up. It took him much too long to do it, but he's finally achieved common sense."

"So give him a chance, will you?" Leslie suggested, smiling at Lani. "Give the poor guy a break and let him have the benefit of the doubt. You might be surprised by how he pulls through, knowing he can count on you to support him and be there for him."

Lani nodded slowly, but there was still a modicum of doubt in her eyes. "But he said he still has some feelings for you," she protested.

"I know that," Leslie told her. "He said himself that it's not like flipping a switch and instantly turning it all off. It'll take time." She regarded the other woman. "I understand you were married before Hachiro. How long did it take before you fell out of love with your ex-husband?"

"I hate that man," Lani said vehemently, and caught the look Leslie and Michiko exchanged. She cleared her throat. "But I see what you mean. Warren cheated on me five times with five different women. They all looked like runway models. But stupid me, I kept taking him back because he was my sons' father, and I loved him in spite of it. When I first met him, he made me feel like a billion dollars. It lasted long enough to hook me really good, so I agreed to marry him. Then I got pregnant with Aaron and looked like a beached whale, and that ticked him off. I thought having sons would mellow out his feelings, but even that didn't make him act any nicer. I spent both my pregnancies enduring mean remarks from him. He was a bully, and he killed my feelings for him."

"But how long did that take?" Leslie pressed.

Lani looked knowingly at her. "I can see the point you're trying to make. It took me a good six months to stop loving Warren. So you're telling me to give Hachiro time and be patient with him, and it'll stop eventually, huh?"

"That's the idea," said Leslie, grinning.

Lani sighed, threw her hands in the air and grinned back. "Okay, I give up. The two of you have succeeded in showing me what a dopey little shrew I am. Would it help if I went back to your mother's place and really sat down and talked with Hachiro?"

"I think it'd do you both a world of good," Michiko said, smiling. "You're not so dopey at all, Lani. You were just scared of what you saw as a threat."

"But I can still be a shrew," Lani said impishly, and they all laughed. She arose. "Hey, thanks, Leslie, and I apologize for attacking you when I first got here. Thanks for your time and for helping me see a few things."

"Hey, anytime," said Leslie. "How long will you be here?"

"Till the end of the month," Lani said. "I'm sure we'll see each other before then."

"We probably will," Leslie agreed. "Well, good luck with Hachiro. Just give him a chance and I really think he'll come through."

When she was gone, Michiko shifted in her seat and grinned. "I wanted to stay a few minutes and catch up. We just don't seem to see each other even when I'm here."

"Well, you're here now and I'm not doing anything, so what's happening?" Leslie asked playfully, and the longtime friends laughed.

Before Michiko could respond, though, a small voice asked from across the room, "Mommy?" Leslie shifted her attention to Susanna, and Michiko twisted in her seat to peer over her shoulder at the little girl.

"What, sweetie?" Leslie asked.

"Tan I tum out now?" Susanna wanted to know.

"Me too," Karina begged, tilting her head to one side and trying to disarm Leslie with the most adorable pleading expression she had ever seen.

"Me too," Tobias chimed in, unwilling to be left out.

Leslie started to chuckle, unable to help herself. "Okay, but you three need to behave yourselves," she said. "I want to talk with my friend, and I don't want to hear you guys fighting, you understand? Play nicely."

"We will," the triplets chorused and slid off their seats, all in perfect unison, to return to the toys they had been playing with earlier.

Michiko laughed. "They sound as if they rehearsed that!"

"Well, they've done it often enough, I'm not surprised," Leslie commented with a grin. "Anyway, how's the vacation been going? Heard from Errico recently?"

"I get a call or an e-mail from him at least once a week," Michiko said. She resettled herself in her chair and frowned a little. "He's been so tired, Leslie…at least the last year, I think. He doesn't seem to get enough sleep, and his appetite isn't what it used to be."

"Maybe it's all the stress he's put himself through trying to get Marcolo and Paolono married off," Leslie suggested. "With Paolono engaged and Marcolo seeing one woman exclusively, he ought to be able to relax."

"You'd think so," Michiko agreed. "But being king is a pretty stressful job, and there's always something hanging over his head. It's only that he seems a lot worse off than he should be, somehow. I'm not used to him looking that worn-out. I asked the boys to keep an eye on their father and make sure he's eating enough and getting enough sleep, but I don't know how closely they're watching him. They're pretty caught up in their own lives now as it is, and I don't think they see what I do."

"Well, tell them again," Leslie urged. "He's their father; they should pay a little more attention than that." She hesitated, then ventured, "Have you told him he might want to see a doctor?"

"He'll only say it's exhaustion," Michiko said with a shrug. "Both Errico and the doctor will say that, if I know them. Maybe I'm just worrying too much. Errico does work hard, and he tends to thrive on that. He loves touring the country, meeting the people. And when he does, he just lights up. He may be old-fashioned and Adriana may complain about it, but he truly loves his people and he'd do anything for them."

Leslie nodded. "He's a good man. Maybe if you managed to get him to see a doctor, and publicized the results, and put out a little hint to the people that they should let Errico have a nice vacation…"

They grinned at each other. "Errico wouldn't know what to do with himself," said Michiko comfortably. "You know how he always seemed to be at loose ends whenever he came here with me. I don't know, maybe he'll slow down after Paolono and Lindalia are married. Seeing the heir apparent safely wed should do wonders for his peace of mind."

Leslie nodded agreement. "It still sounds to me like he needs a doctor, no matter what either he or said doctor might have to say about it. But of course, that's up to you." She cast a glance at the triplets, who sat with their backs to one another, each diligently involved with a favorite toy. "Next time you talk to him, give him Christian's and my greetings."


	4. Chapter 4

§ § § - August 12, 2007

"I guess this is gonna make you roll your eyes," Lani was saying in conclusion, "but it's true—Leslie actually gave me a new point of view on the whole thing, and she helped me see how dumb and closed-minded I've been." She leaned forward and grasped Hachiro's hands, trying to discern something in his eyes other than blankness. "Please believe me—I'm sorry, you don't know how much. I can see why you might not, but I'm serious."

Hachiro sat still for a minute or so, looking carefully at her. She looked as serious as she claimed to be; her gaze was steady, and something in her manner felt firm and reassuring to him. He dared let himself think, for the first time in some three months, that things were going back to normal for them. When he smiled, she relaxed with such an exaggerated body sag that he laughed out loud. "I didn't know you were that scared," he teased.

"I was," Lani said, nodding hard. "I thought maybe I'd finally come to my senses a little too late. What a relief."

Hachiro grinned. "Believe me, it's just as much of a relief to me as it is to you. And it's a good thing we've finally gotten our act together." He sobered, recalling the phone call he'd received during Lani's absence. "We need to present a united front."

"Why? What happened?" Lani's face paled a little.

He sighed. "When's the last time anybody saw Ephraim?"

Her face grew chalky. "Shortly after breakfast," she said in a wary voice.

He grunted quietly and closed his eyes for a second or two. "I don't know how to sugarcoat this," he admitted. "I don't think it's possible. But see, while you were gone, there was a call from the town police." Lani gasped, and he squeezed both her hands. "They said they picked up Ephraim in the town square for shoplifting at the grocery store. Told me he was caught red-handed."

Lani's eyes filled with tears, but she tried to keep her voice even. "Did they…are they keeping him in a jail cell, or what?"

"Not in a cell, but they've detained him at the station, and when we get there they'll release him to our recognizance. I'm sorry, honey."

Lani pulled one hand free and backhanded the tears away, shaking her head as if at the end of her rope. "I don't know what to do with him anymore. His grades in school are awful, he picks on the younger kids and torments Olivia, he fights with Aaron all the time, he never plays anything by the rules…I've never seen such an angry kid." She met his gaze with hopelessness and pleading in her eyes. "What are we gonna do with him?"

"Well, why don't we go on down to the station and see what the story is? Mama-san shouldn't mind if we use her car. She never drove it much, and not at all since Dad died." He pulled her to her feet and hugged her. "Come on, let's go see what's really up."

"Maybe it's because his grades were so bad that he has to repeat eighth grade, and he's acting out because of it," Lani mumbled, unresistingly allowing him to tow her along with him to the car that sat in the driveway. "I told him he should have known better and done his schoolwork, but all he did was sneer at me and then said something no kid should ever get away with saying to his mother."

Hachiro stopped to eye her over his shoulder. "What'd he say?"

"The F-word, and 'off'," Lani said tiredly, closing her eyes at the memory.

Hachiro's first impulse was to backhand the kid a whopper, but he carefully counted to five before he even responded. "We're gonna have to find out what's behind all this."

At the police station, they were greeted by a sullen fourteen-year-old who glared at them from a bench at the back wall of the station's front room. Lani stared back at him in despair while Hachiro asked, "What did he take?"

"He was caught with this." The current sheriff, who had held the post since Masato's original replacement, Clark Mokuleia, had left and was by now well known and liked around the island, held up a bottle of soda and a large candy bar. "He claims he had the cash to pay for it, but he won't tell us why he decided not to."

"Ephraim, how could you?" Lani finally asked in disbelief.

" 'How could you?' " Ephraim mocked her in a squeaky voice, standing up and sauntering across to them. "It was easy. All I had to do was pick 'em up and head for the door."

"Except you managed to get caught," Hachiro inserted caustically. "I suppose you know what that means."

"What, another meaningless grounding?" Ephraim shot back, rolling his eyes. "It's an empty threat, Hachiro, you know that. Sitting around my room with nothing to do. Who cares? I can still do anything I want, just in my room."

Hachiro spared him only a glance, long enough to thank the sheriff and herd Ephraim outside along with Lani. Then he turned on the boy. "You really think we're going to just ground you this time? I've let your mother handle you as much as possible, because she's hoping if she treats you well, you might have the good sense to reciprocate. Instead, you've turned into a monster who thinks he's entitled to anything he feels like, anytime he wants. Well, I've got news for you, pal. No video games. No bike-riding. No seeing friends. Any invitations we get while we're here on this island, you're excluded—which, by the way, is the real meaning of a 'grounding', in case you were wondering. You're fourteen, but even a kid half your age has better sense than to pull a stupid stunt like that. And since you can't seem to be bothered to grow up as you get older, it looks like we'll have to hire a babysitter to stay with you if all the rest of us go somewhere together."

"You can't do that," Ephraim sniped, red-faced with rage. "You're not my father!"

"I'm your stepfather, and you live under the same roof with me and your mother. That subjects you to our rules, and if you don't follow the rules, you pay the price. And that, pal, is the price. I don't care if you like it or not; you're going to get punished, and you'll abide by the terms. Now get in the car."

Ephraim glowered but climbed into the back seat; when Hachiro had them back on the road toward home, Lani turned in her seat and stared at him. After a long time she asked plaintively, "What's gotten into you, Ephraim? Why are you doing all these things?"

He merely glared at her till she sighed and turned to face the front again; no one said anything else till they had parked and were back inside the house. Then he finally exploded. "You two are the lousiest parents on earth! Never paid me any attention. Aaron the goody-goody got all the attention because he kept volunteering to babysit all the little brats, and you just kept popping out one kid after another till the place looks like a boarding school. It's too noisy and too crowded, and the little bastards are always coming in and fooling around with my stuff." He snarled at Hachiro when he saw his stepfather's reaction to the word _bastards_. "They are, you know. Every one of those stupid little kids is a worthless brat that can't keep his hands to himself. They're all pieces of—"

"Shut your mouth this instant!" Lani screamed at him, for what Hachiro was sure must be the first time ever, at least to his knowledge. "I've let you get away with too much for too long, and you know it and you've been taking advantage! If I have to tie you to a post in the garage to make you see I mean business, I will, and if you think I wouldn't dare, you just go ahead and try me, buster! I've absolutely had all I can stand of your crassness, your smart mouth, your cursing and name-calling, and your general snottiness! If you can't clean up your act and your mouth, then I promise you, there'll be some serious consequences!"

Ephraim stared at her in pure surprise, which lasted perhaps five seconds once she'd reached the end of her tirade. Then he spat at her, making her flinch back, and announced, "I want to go live with Dad. At least there I'd get some attention!"

"Hah," Lani barked, too angry to censor herself. "Not if he's involved with some big-busted bimbo with more hair than brains. Warren never gave a damn about anyone but himself, and he never will. He lives to hurt people. If he's got some chesty college cheerleader living with him, you can bet you'll be as good as invisible to him." She didn't wait to see what effect this had on Ephraim, but instead stormed down to the lower level and disappeared.

"That's what she thinks," Ephraim said, snorting. "I know Dad better than she ever did. He paid attention to me. Always told me I was his real son and Aaron was just a wimpy carbon copy of her." He eyed Hachiro, who had been watching the entire time. "I don't care what she says. I want to live with my dad—my real dad, not some pale imitation."

"Then by all means, go, and be welcome to the jerk," said Hachiro tonelessly, and took secret satisfaction in seeing the startled look in Ephraim's eyes. "Since you obviously think we're all beneath you, then I'll be thrilled to send you off to Warren. I'll even pay for the phone call you make to him to tell him you want to come live with him."

"Good," Ephraim barked, and would have plunged out the front door if not for Hachiro's fist on his shoulder, faster than Ephraim would likely have thought possible.

"Not so fast there," Hachiro said, his voice almost friendly. "When I said you're grounded and you're not allowed to go anywhere or do anything, I meant just that. Get up here in the living room and sit down. You don't even get to read a magazine or watch TV. You just sit and think about what you want to tell Warren when you call him." Ephraim cursed under his breath and Hachiro yanked on his arm, making him gasp. "Watch your mouth, kid, or I might just carry out your mother's threat about tying you to a post in the garage. You think we're a couple of wussy pushovers, but you've got another think coming. We live by rules around here, and you're not exempt. Go plant your butt on that chair and see if, just once, you can't come up with some more original vocabulary than the F-bomb." He pointed at an armchair in the corner and waited till Ephraim had sat in it before nodding with satisfaction, then taking a seat on the couch and making himself comfortable with a magazine.

"Hey," said Ephraim in surprise after a moment. "How come you're not going out back to play some stupid damn game with those brats of yours?"

"Because I don't trust you," Hachiro said flatly, giving him a glare that actually made him blink. "I told you earlier, you have to be babysat because you're a three-year-old in a fourteen-year-old's body. And by the way, that's the last cussword you get free of charge. I dare you to say another four-letter word, just so you can see what happens."

"Whatcha gonna do, big man?" sneered Ephraim. "Think you're so tough, what can you do that'd scare me?"

Hachiro smiled, a slow smile that elicited another blink. "Go ahead and find out," he said silkily, "if you dare."

For the first time, Ephraim was silent, looking rebellious, but no longer possessing the bravado to test his stepfather any further. He slouched in the chair, and Hachiro went back to his magazine, careful to hide his relief. He really had no idea what kind of consequence to mete out on the boy if he swore again—at least, nothing that wouldn't be construed as child abuse, he thought grimly. He'd probably have to have a consultation with his mother and Michiko, just to see what ideas they had.

After about half an hour, Ephraim announced sullenly, "I wanna make that call to my dad now."

"Fine, what's his number?" Hachiro asked. He reached for the cordless phone on the end table beside him, punching out numbers as Ephraim reeled them off. Then he handed Ephraim the phone and settled back once more, watching the boy.

"Yeah, Dad? It's me," he said. After a couple of seconds, his eyes widened a little and he said as if in protest, "Ephraim. Your son."

Whatever Warren said made Ephraim's face redden a bit, but it was clear the boy was determined. "Well, I wanted to ask you something. I'm sick and tired of living with Mom and Hachiro and all their bratty little sh…" He caught Hachiro's warning glare and curled his lip, but amended his words anyway. "Kids. It's a madhouse all the time and I hate it. I wanna come and live with you."

Even Hachiro heard the shocked "What the hell for?" that blasted out of the phone. Ephraim yanked it away from his ear, then put it back and pleaded, "I just told you, Dad, I'm sick of all the kids around, getting into my stuff. They never pay enough attention to any one of us, especially me, 'cause there're too many kids around. Aaron's Mom's favorite since he's always volunteering to babysit or help somebody with their homework, but I just get kicked around all the time. We had some great times before Mom got that divorce. C'mon, Dad, please? It could be so cool, just you 'n' me…"

After a moment he went on in a startled voice, "Nobody put me up to it. It was my idea, and Hachiro even let me call you from his mom's place. Huh? Oh, we're on Fantasy Island till the end of the month. I bet Mom and Hachiro'll put me on the plane and you can meet me at the airport on the other end. We could send for my stuff." As he finished speaking, Lani topped the steps from the lower level and started to say something, but caught herself when Hachiro put a finger to his lips. Ephraim was too involved in his conversation to take notice of his mother's arrival.

"Aw, Dad, please?" Ephraim wheedled, sounding much younger than his actual age. "I can't take it anymore. Dad…I thought you cared about me!"

Hachiro had to stifle a smile. _That's it, play the guilt game,_ he thought, happy to see Warren get the brunt of it for a change. It didn't seem that Warren was buying it, though; after what sounded like a very long diatribe, judging from the occasional sparks of sharp, angry voice emerging from the phone, Ephraim sagged in the chair, looking as though his whole world had imploded. "Dad…" he moaned, begging outright.

Another sharp command split the air and Ephraim let his arm relax in defeat, closing his eyes and holding out the phone. "He wants to talk to either you or Mom," he said dully.

Lani shook her head, so Hachiro shrugged and took the phone from his stepson. "Yeah, Warren," he said, without bothering to greet the other man.

"Hachiro? What the hell is this you're cooking up, trying to foist that kid off on me? Whaddaya think you're doing? This Lani's idea?"

"No, the kid told you the truth—it was entirely his idea," Hachiro said. "He thinks we're all giving him short shrift, and figures he'll have it better at your place."

Warren cursed. "The agreement was that Lani raised both those boys and didn't bother me for anything beyond child support. Damn that kid, he should be grateful I send money to pay for his clothes and whatever crap he wants from the toy store. Why's he calling me asking to come live here?"

Hachiro rolled his eyes and spoke his mind, something he realized in a back corner of his brain he'd been doing a lot of lately. "You know, Warren, you're probably the sorriest excuse for a human being, much less a father, that ever walked the earth. He's your son, he loves you and he wants to live with you. Most fathers'd kill for that, but all you can do is complain and ask why. What's wrong—having a kid around would disrupt your playboy lifestyle and your slick, polished image, huh? Or are you just allergic to responsibility?"

"Why, you—" Warren wasted at least a full minute on a swear-laden rant, while Hachiro stood tapping his foot and staring wearily at the ceiling. Finally the other man grew coherent enough to make a little sense. "You got some nerve, telling me how I oughta live my life!"

"Your language reflects on you," Hachiro remarked, something he remembered his father having said often when he and his siblings were growing up. "You sound like a total imbecile. What's the matter, did somebody not give you everything you wanted when you were a sniveling little roach in diapers? How about you try thinking about something other than your latest teenage conquest, and see what it feels like to be a real adult for a change?"

Even Ephraim looked astounded at the barrage of screamed curses that poured out of the phone; he sat there blinking, and Lani leaned wearily against the wall beside the steps, as though the mere sound of Warren's voice was enough to enervate her. But they all clearly heard Warren's final howl of, "I don't want that damn kid, _ever!"_

"He heard that, you know," Hachiro observed calmly into the phone.

"He was supposed to!" Warren roared.

Ephraim leaped up in the middle of this speech and snatched the phone away from Hachiro before anyone else could react. "You liar!" he shouted into the phone. "You big, fat, selfish liar! You told me you loved me. You told me I was your _real_ son. You told me a whole bunch of other stupid lies too. You _lousy liar!_ I hope you fall off your boat and _drown!"_ With that, he disconnected the call and made as if to hurl the phone across the room, but Hachiro managed to seize it before he could wind up, and replaced it.

"Hey, Eph…" Hachiro began.

"Just leave me alone!" Ephraim howled and started to run, then caught himself and spat, "Oh, yeah, right…I'm grounded. Thanks a lot!" Both Hachiro and Lani could see him shaking with frustration; he stood there poised to run, his head whipping this way and that as though searching for an escape. Then, all at once, he wilted before their eyes and crumpled into the chair where he'd been sitting, covered his face with both hands and began to cry. His whole body convulsed with his misery.

"Ephraim…" Lani began, venturing into the room.

"Leave me alone," Ephraim wailed. "Go away. Just go away."

Hachiro intercepted her and put a hand on her arm. "Let him be for now, honey. We can try again later. Maybe when he's calmer, the three of us can sit and talk, and he can tell us exactly what his beefs are, and we'll see what we can do about them."

"I hope so," Lani murmured hopelessly. "But right now I'm not sure I believe it."

"You gotta have some faith," Hachiro said gently, urging her down the stairs.

"Not anymore. He hates us and doesn't care how much he hurts us." Lani sighed and fell silent; Hachiro tossed a glance behind him as he guided her along, wondering how much of that Ephraim had heard.

§ § § - August 18, 2007

By the following Saturday, the Tokita household was mostly calm, but there was a clear rift between the still-angry Ephraim and the rest of the family. Only Miyoshi seemed to be the center of the storm, a calm eye around whom the rest circled in various stages of excitement, anger, or simple weariness.

Michiko was one of the weary ones, and with her daughter, came looking for Leslie during the quiet of a Saturday midday. She was a little surprised to find Camille sitting in the office chatting with Leslie; Robin, now four, was playing happily with Susanna and Karina, with Haruko Miyamoto sitting nearby watching them and reading a magazine.

"Oh…I didn't know you had company," Michiko said, blinking.

"Hi," Leslie said, and Camille smiled a warm greeting. "Come on in, you're not interrupting anything. Hi, Cat."

"Hi, Miss Leslie," Cat said with a bashful little smile. She glanced at the other children seated around the tea table. "Could I play too?"

"Of course," Leslie said, "go right ahead. Come on and sit down, Michiko."

Michiko released Cat's hand, smiled wanly in response to Haruko's greeting smile, and all but fell into the other leather chair. "I guess Mr. Roarke's got you holding down the fort again."

"I'm officially on call," Leslie said jokingly, "so if I get the word, I may have to abandon you in here." She grinned, and Camille laughed; Michiko managed another wan smile but didn't move otherwise. Leslie tilted her head at her friend. "What's wrong?"

"Seemingly everything," Michiko murmured. "It's mostly Lani's son Ephraim, the younger one from her first marriage. That's one of the angriest kids I've ever seen. I don't want to bore you with all the excruciating details, but it kind of came to a head last Sunday when he got caught red-handed, shoplifting in town."

"Wow," said Camille, amazed. "What'd he take?"

"He tried to get away with a soda and a candy bar, but as I said, he was caught red-handed, and Hachiro and Lani had to pick him up at the police station. Hachiro grounded him—apparently they've just tossed that off in the past without enforcing it, but this time he made it stick, he was so angry. Ephraim is confined to the house for the rest of their stay here. He called his father and tried to get him to agree to let him live there, but Hachiro told us the man rejected him and said Ephraim should be grateful he pays Lani child support."

"Creep," said Camille. "That guy's nothing but a sperm donor."

Michiko nodded. "So at any rate, Ephraim's been smoldering ever since then, but so far he's actually stuck to Hachiro's ultimatum. But it's wearing the rest of us out. Lani looks as if her spirit's been broken, and Hachiro looks exhausted. I'm fed up with tiptoeing around that boy. The other children steer clear of him and pretend he doesn't exist, which I think fuels the fire. Only my mother carries on normally. At this rate I'll need a vacation from my vacation, and I expect Hachiro will too."

Camille peered at her and remarked a little acerbically, "Well, there's always boarding school. They still have those, don't they? We used to threaten David with it as a last resort, and he wouldn't believe us till he caught Jimmy browsing boarding schools online. That finally made him wise up."

Leslie laughed. "Christian said his parents took him to look at boarding schools in Europe when he was around thirteen or so. I've heard there were boarding schools in New England, but I don't know if any still exist."

"I think they're very expensive," Michiko said, "and while we could have afforded to send our kids, I don't think Hachiro and Lani have that sort of means. I think if they really did decide to send Ephraim to boarding school, it'd have to be a military one. I don't know if they'd take him, though—he'll have to repeat the eighth grade when school starts again."

"Huh…well, it's an option at least," Camille remarked, "even if it's a scarce one."

Michiko only shrugged. "At any rate, we still have to deal with him. He's sullen and doesn't talk, and glares at anyone who gets in his way."

"Why is he so angry?" Leslie asked.

"He claims there are too many kids and that Hachiro and Lani don't have enough resources to pay the proper attention to them all, because of that. He says the youngest kids get into his things all the time, and he treats everyone with contempt. He slacks off in school and Lani says he's a bully, from what she's heard back. She remarked last evening to me that if Warren hadn't so forcefully turned them down, she would've put Ephraim on the very next plane out and been happy to let Warren deal with him."

Leslie considered it. "What he probably needs is something to channel his resources. Do you know much about him? I mean, have you noticed there's anything special he has an interest in? Maybe they could enroll him in a martial-arts school or have him join the school wrestling team, if he likes that and keeps his grades up. Maybe if someone approached him and asked him what he likes, he might respond."

"He may be beyond hope," Michiko murmured.

Camille blinked at her. "Holy paradise, Michiko, when you say something like that, it probably means he is. You're usually so optimistic. That Ephraim must be a total horror to get that kind of reaction out of you."

Michiko looked up, then glanced fretfully towards where her daughter was playing with the other children and Haruko was still engrossed in her magazine. Then she lowered her voice and admitted, "It's not entirely Ephraim. Paolono called me two days ago and said Errico took a bad fall that morning, and had to see the doctor for a broken ankle. While he was there, the doctor took the opportunity to give Errico a good solid physical, and he found something that disturbed him. He's sending the X-rays he took to a lab. He thinks there may be something malignant in Errico's brain."

Leslie and Camille looked at each other, then both got up and wrapped their friend in a hug. Haruko looked up in surprise and concern, but glanced at the kids and held her silence, for which Leslie thanked her with a quick nod and smile. Camille murmured, "Oh wow, I'm so sorry. I hope they're wrong."

"Me too," Leslie said. "It's not definite yet, right? So you still have hope, and we'll all be with you, you know that."

Michiko had begun to cry a little. She sniffled, muffled against Leslie's shoulder, and mumbled, "I'm so lucky to have all of you."

"Do you have to go back home right away?" Leslie asked.

"Paolono told me to stay here for now, and if it turns out to be the…the worst-case scenario, then I should bring Cat back to Arcolos." Michiko's body heaved with a sob or two before she sucked in a long, deep breath and straightened, regaining control with a great effort. "I didn't mean to—"

"Oh, knock it off. That's why we're here. You need somebody to lean on, and you've been under a lot of stress, between that kid of Lani's and now this. Say, listen—we're having a gigantic cookout at my parents' place come Monday evening. Bring the whole gang, huh? We're all supposed to be meeting Julianne's boyfriend's family, and Anton and Andrea have his kids visiting till the last week of the month, so it's gonna be a big one. Mom and Dad decided we might as well go all out and invite some friends too. So you're all on the guest list, and Leslie, you can bring Christian and the kids. Myeko, Maureen, Tabitha, Lauren, Katsumi and all their families are coming too." Camille grinned at Michiko. "Tell Hachiro and Lani they're on the guest list, and see if Lani's willing to bring something. We figure, with all the people coming, we'll make it a potluck."

Michiko laughed shakily and brushed a furtive hand over her eyes. "It's a deal. And I think I can talk Lani into making something…maybe even Hachiro."


	5. Chapter 5

§ § § - August 20, 2007

"So we're all invited? Including all the kids?" Lani asked in amazement over lunch that Monday. "That's really generous."

"She says it'll be a potluck, so I thought maybe you and I could get out our largest bowls and whip up some potato salad," Michiko suggested.

Hachiro, constructing a large roast-beef sandwich at the counter, glanced into the dining room where the children were all eating around the table there, and said implacably, "Everybody goes except Ephraim. He's still grounded, you know."

Lani twisted around in her chair to stare at him. "But we can't just leave him here by himself. Who knows what havoc he'd wreak if he's allowed to be alone."

Miyoshi, busy at the counter chopping an entire bagful of red bell peppers, paused long enough to encompass them all in her serene glance. "I stay home," she said. "Ephraim stay with me. Have much cooking to do."

Lani looked shocked; Hachiro shook his head. "That wouldn't be right, Mama-san," he protested. "To leave you at Ephraim's mercy? He's been a horror…"

"No, not so bad." Miyoshi smiled. "You wait and see. Ephraim will not disobey me. I never tell you this, but once Saburo was very bad, exactly as Ephraim now. And you know how Saburo is now, yes?"

Hachiro and Michiko looked at each other, and Hachiro asked, "Did he have to repeat a grade in school?"

"Did he terrorize Kayoko?" Michiko put in.

"Was he a notorious bully?" contributed Lani.

"Yes, but not repeat grade in school," said Miyoshi. "I made him right. Papa-san too. Now you wait, you leave Ephraim to me, yes? Go to Ichinos' cookout and not worry. I will go on with my work, you do what you must, and enjoy." She began to replace uncut peppers into a mesh bag. "I cut these later. If you make potato salad, you need this space."

Lani and Michiko put up token protests, but Miyoshi went on as if she were deaf, which finally silenced them and made them grin resignedly at each other. "I guess we trust your mother," Lani said, which earned her a broad smile of approval from Miyoshi.

"Good idea," Hachiro said and chuckled. "To tell you the truth, I'm really looking forward to getting a break." He edged aside, sandwich in one hand, and kissed his mother's cheek. _"Domo arigato, Mama-san._ You're a heroine."

"We have to go out and get some things for the salad, but don't worry, there'll be enough for the mob," Michiko said playfully. "Let's think of something fun for a change."

The afternoon drifted by; Ephraim skulked off to the living room, where he sat and stared into space while Hachiro sorted through a box of books his late father had left behind. In the kitchen he could hear his wife and sister chatting and laughing as they boiled potatoes, chopped them up and began putting together two massive bowls of potato salad; the voices of the other children, playing either out back or around the house, provided a discordant backdrop. Eventually Lani came out and told him it was just about time to leave, the potato salad was ready, and they needed to round up the kids.

"Leave for what?" Ephraim asked, showing enough interest to really surprise both Hachiro and Lani.

"A cookout with some friends of ours," Michiko said, coming in with her arms around an enormous plastic-wrapped bowl heaping with potato salad.

"But you're staying," Lani added. "You're still grounded."

Ephraim stared at her, then looked at Hachiro as if in appeal. But Hachiro nodded. "My mother will be here with you." He raised his voice. "Hey, kids! Aaron?"

Lani reeled off a spiel that was commonplace in their Hawaii home, Michiko suspected, judging from how rote it sounded. "Liam-Cody-Zachary-Griffen-Tyler-Olivia! Shoes on, let's get going! We're headed for a cookout!"

"Catalina, do you have your shoes on?" Michiko called down the hall to the bedrooms.

"Coming, Mother," Cat's voice returned, and gradually she and all of Hachiro and Lani's kids gathered in the foyer, Aaron carrying Olivia. Hachiro shoved the box under the coffee table for the time being, and joined everyone else in the foyer.

"Isn't Eph coming?" Aaron asked in surprise.

"He better not," Cody, nearly seven, snapped. "He'd just ruin everything."

"Yeah, he's a crummy old bully," piped up Griffen, who had just turned four.

"That's enough," Hachiro admonished. "Ephraim's still grounded, so he's staying here with your grandmother. The Ichinos live on the next street over, so we can walk. Everybody fall in and march…hup, two, three, four…"

"Have very good time," Miyoshi called after them, and most of them waved back at her as they trooped out the door.

Hachiro hesitated in the doorway. "You sure you'll be okay, Mama-san?"

"You not worry," his mother said and winked. "Everything is fine. Go and enjoy, and give my greeting to Paul and Katie, yes? Go now."

Hachiro laughed, a little tiredly, and left without further protest. When he had closed the door, silence reigned supreme for just a moment while Ephraim gaped at the empty foyer as if he'd been betrayed. Before he could react any further, Miyoshi took charge. "Now, Ephraim, you come into kitchen with me. Have much to do and need your help."

Her tone was brisk and no-nonsense; Ephraim revolved in the chair to stare at her. "Whaddaya need me for? I'm no good."

"Not so. Everyone is good at something. Now you come with me and we will see what you are good at, yes? Come into kitchen." Miyoshi disappeared therein, and Ephraim was left with little choice but to follow.

He paused in the middle of the floor to watch her extract a bag of red peppers from the refrigerator; this was followed by another of yellow peppers and a third containing green ones. All three mesh bags were quite large and each held at least ten peppers. "What're you gonna do with those?" Ephraim asked, in spite of himself.

"I chop them," Miyoshi answered and pulled two sharp knives from a block on the counter. "You help me. You are fourteen, yes? You know how to use knife without hurt?" At his uncertain nod, she beckoned. "Then you come and help."

Slowly Ephraim approached the counter and, with some trepidation, accepted one of the knives from Miyoshi. "Okay…where do I start?"

‡ ‡ ‡

Over at the Ichinos' house, there was quite a daunting mob. Leslie had stopped counting after she reached 30, but she was convinced there must be a good fifty people at the house. It was fortunate that the cookout was a potluck affair; Christian commented in awe at the size of the tables and the amount of food they held. "No wonder you insisted we needed six gallon jars of cherry seltzer."

"I hope it's enough," Leslie said doubtfully, scanning the tables.

She and Christian heard a laugh from behind and found themselves facing Katie Ichino, Camille's mother, who at 69 had a full head of shining gray hair and a road map of honest lines and wrinkles from raising seven children across a total of almost forty years. "It should be. Everyone's restricted to one cup so we all have a chance to try it. Christian, isn't that drink produced commercially in your home country?"

"It's been tried," Christian said with a wry grin. "Cherry seltzer began somewhere in the 1930s as a backlash against the invasion of the big American soda companies, and it was always homemade. It never drove out the conglomerates, but within just a few years it had become a national tradition. To my knowledge there have been two earnest attempts to produce it for year-round consumption, but both failed spectacularly. The appeal of cherry seltzer lies in the fact that it's made exclusively at home by its consumers."

"Goodness," said Katie, looking amazed. "That's quite a feat. What goes in it?"

Christian listed the ingredients for her while Camille sidled up to them, tuning in till he had finished. When her mother had nodded with great interest and asked Christian if he'd mind passing on a copy of the recipe, she spoke up: "Mom, Michiko's here with her daughter, and Hachiro and Lani brought most of their kids. I think we just doubled the attendance here now that they've shown up."

"We should've made two more gallon jars' worth," Leslie fretted.

Christian, Camille and Katie laughed. "We'll make it last," Katie promised, patting Leslie's shoulder. "What did they bring, Camille?"

"About four tons of potato salad," Camille said. "Although I don't know how long it'll last, with a whole pack of hungry boys roaming around."

Katie chuckled. "Round up your brothers and have them help." As Camille left, she glanced around the backyard and then grinned at Christian and Leslie. "Julianne promised she would bring her boyfriend's family—it'll be the first time both sides have met. I understand they come from some little island off the Massachusetts coast."

"Nantucket," Leslie provided. "I met Adam the same night he and Julianne met, and he told me where he came from. I imagine you and his family will be comparing life on this island and on theirs. Are they here yet?"

"Not so far. Paul's already trying to get hold of Julianne and Jonathan both—they're apparently running late, though goodness knows what's holding Jonathan up. Oh—here comes Jeremy. Jeremy, do you know why Jonathan isn't here yet?"

Jeremy shrugged his shoulders, loping up to his mother's side. "Not a clue, sorry, Mom. Since Holly and I moved into a condo in town, we don't see as much of either him or Julianne as we used to. And anyway, you know how busy Julianne is with Adam." He recognized Christian and Leslie. "Hi, Miss Leslie, Prince Christian. Hey, would you like to meet my wife and our baby?"

"We would," Leslie said with interest. "We never see you guys. How old's the baby?"

"Three weeks," Jeremy said with pride. "Be right back." He hurried off to the house, and Katie smiled.

"You must be in your element with all the grandchildren here," Leslie remarked.

Katie laughed. "Goodness, I can hardly keep up with them. I don't see much of Tommy's son and daughter since they live in Hawaii, and of course Janine's decided her life is in Massachusetts; but there are enough right here on the island to confuse me sometimes. Not to mention Anton's two kids, Andrea's new stepchildren. And if Julianne and Adam get to the point where they get married…" She sighed and gazed into the sky for a moment with a faraway look. "I used to think I had a hard time keeping track of seven children, even as far apart in age as the quads were from the three oldest. But there are times I find myself missing the old days, when they'd bring their friends home. You know, Leslie, I think out of all of them, Camille was the one who had her friends around the most often. Somehow it's easier for me to remember the names of Camille's friends than those of any of the others."

"Yeah, we were pests all right," Leslie agreed playfully, sharing a laugh with her.

Michiko stopped nearby in time to hear this and joined in their laughter. "Seems like there were always a lot of us hanging around," she agreed. "But if you think there were then, just look at this bunch now. Mrs. Ichino, I really think you're going to regret issuing such an open invitation. This looks like one of Mr. Roarke's Saturday-night luaus."

Katie joined in their laughter. "That's just what I was thinking. So how are your brother and his family doing?"

"They're good," Michiko said, a little guardedly, Leslie thought. Her hunch was proved correct when, after a little small talk, Michiko excused herself and beckoned at Leslie to follow her. Christian, evidently sensing that the two friends wanted to talk in private, discreetly veered off to join a group of men hovering around the smoking barbecue grill, while Michiko and Leslie found a couple of empty lawn chairs and took seats.

"So what's not so good, then?" Leslie asked once they'd settled down.

Before Michiko could reply, Jeremy Ichino hove in their direction, cradling a small blanket-wrapped bundle. "Hey, you ran away before you could meet the kid," he scolded humorously. He flexed his knees enough to settle the bundle in Leslie's arms. "This is Kylan, and he was born on July 29."

For a minute both women were distracted over the baby, who still looked like a newborn, a bit red and with a few tentative wisps of black hair peeking out from under the blanket. Kylan Ichino's eyes were tightly closed and one miniature fist clasped the edge of the blanket as if it were a rescue rope. Leslie settled the baby more comfortably in her embrace and smiled down at him. "He's adorable, Jeremy. When did you and Holly move?"

"A couple months before Kylan was born. That gave us enough time to decorate his room. She's planning to be home with him till he hits about six months, and then go back to work. Say…you don't suppose your nanny would be interested in a little side work now and then? After Holly goes back to work, that is? She could sit for Kylan and maybe do some housework—we'd be willing to work out a reasonable wage. It was Holly's idea."

"I can talk it over with Christian and Ingrid," Leslie said. "No promises right now, of course, but I'll let you know, even if I have to do it through Camille."

"No hurry," said Jeremy, "but Holly did say that she might go back sooner if she knows early on that Ingrid's willing. We do need the money. I mean, even with me on the morning shift, my salary won't cover all our expenses, and Holly's getting only two-thirds of her normal pay while she's on maternity leave."

"Like I said, I'll discuss it with Christian and Ingrid," Leslie said. "With the triplets getting old enough to do almost everything for themselves, Ingrid's been reduced essentially to cook, housekeeper and babysitter. So we'll let you know."

"Good enough," Jeremy said. He beamed proudly down at his little son. "Isn't he a bruiser? Weighed almost eight pounds when he was born. I bet he grows up to be a linebacker. That'd be something all right. Kylan Ichino, football star."

"Give the poor kid a few years to grow into your expectations, Jeremy," Michiko scolded with a grin. "He's a little small to compete with the Rams or the Redskins just yet, don't you think? And Holly might have a difference of opinion with you, too."

Jeremy grinned, only a little sheepish. "Yeah, maybe. But hey, a guy can dream, right? Well, I see I kind of interrupted something over here, so let me get Kylan and get out of your way. They'll probably want me for pack-mule duty getting the food outside anyway." He retrieved Kylan and, with a last grin, departed.

"He's cute," Michiko remarked. "Almost makes you want to have another one."

Leslie laughed. "Yeah, _almost_ being the operative word here. Well, okay then, to pick up where we left off…what's going on? Any news yet on Errico?"

"Nothing yet. But honestly, living in that house, with Hachiro's family around, has been such a trial this week. Ever since they grounded Ephraim…" She caught herself and cast her gaze around the yard, as if trying to locate all her brother's children.

"Is he here?" Leslie asked.

"No, Hachiro and Lani enforced his grounding, so he's at the house with my mother. She's been the eye of the storm all this time, carrying on as if everything's normal. Everyone else is operating with shot nerves. I don't envy Hachiro and Lani, dealing with that boy. And to tell you the truth, I'm a little worried about my mother."

"Oh, come on. You don't think she could handle the kid?"

"Well, she always had my father to back her up when somebody, usually Hachiro, was being fractious, as we were growing up. But she hasn't had to discipline kids for years, and my father's not around to give her edicts extra weight. There's so much anger in that boy—who knows what he might be capable of." Michiko sighed and met Leslie's gaze again. "And Hachiro's been quietly stewing over Mother's decision to sell the house. I don't know why. It's not as if he and Lani are planning to move back here, unless he wants to ditch that lucrative job he has with Tommy. Reiko's happy in Arcolos with Mattéano, and Saburo says he doesn't need such a big house, and of course Kayoko has her own place here already."

Leslie waited, but Michiko fell silent, and she finally cleared her throat. "What about you? I notice you conveniently left yourself out."

"I don't know yet," Michiko murmured. "There's so much else on my mind, I don't want to think about trying to sell the house or who might buy it. If Errico thought I missed home that badly, he'd tell me to buy it as a vacation place in a heartbeat, but it happens to be my opinion that other things should take first priority."

"They should," Leslie agreed.

"I was going to hop the first plane out, but Paolono told me to stay put till we know more. He says if the mass is benign, then there'll be no reason to cut my vacation short. But it's almost over anyway, so I don't see the difference. He wouldn't listen to me and told me to stick with my original plans. That boy! I'm sure Errico's wondering why I'm not at his side—not to mention everyone else in Arcolos—and Paolono as good as orders me to stay on holiday till the bitter end."

Leslie laid her hand on her friend's arm and smiled faintly. "Is there any way you can contact Errico? You shouldn't have to settle for going through your stepson; you and Errico ought to be speaking directly to each other without the middleman."

"True," Michiko admitted through a sigh. "I don't seem to be thinking straight. He's at the palace, after all, and I know he can operate a computer, no matter what he may tell Christian." She arose suddenly, causing Leslie to automatically follow suit. "I'm going to find Camille and see if she can help me get to a computer. I've really got to know."

Leslie nodded, wished her luck and watched her head across the yard in search of Camille. Then she shoved her hands into her jeans pockets and wandered away herself, noting that Christian seemed to be enjoying the conversation he was having with Kazuo, Grady, Jimmy, Nick and Fernando, and loath to break in where it wasn't necessary. After a moment or two a flurry caught her eye and she looked around in time to see Michiko and Camille on their way to the house. With a last glance back at Christian, she made a split-second decision and broke into a run to catch up with her friends.


	6. Chapter 6

§ § § - August 20, 2007

Brianna Harding and Noelle Tokita were sitting together, talking aimlessly about one thing or another, speculating on what eighth grade might be like when it started in a couple of weeks, wondering how many of their Coral Island acquaintances from the Air Force base would still be there and how many new kids they might see. They had seen no one else their age at this party, and they were feeling a bit cliquish and left out because of this. Most of the children there were younger than they were by at least several years; there were a lot of preschoolers, and those few who seemed to be old enough for them to bother with were all at least a couple of years older than they. There was such a crowd that they had yet to find out the identities of all the attendees.

"Well, I hope that idiot Stewart Bliss finally got transferred to some other base," said Noelle, slapping a bug off her thigh and reaching absently down to scratch one ankle. "He's really the bane of my entire existence. Did I tell you what he did to me right before the end of school last year?"

"Only about a hundred times," Brianna said with a wry grin, and Noelle grinned back. "Don't sweat it, Noelle, we're going into eighth grade and that means we're gonna rule the middle school."

"True. I heard Mr. Roarke's been trying to hire more teachers who live here on the island so that we don't end up with so many new ones every single year. Mom said Miss Leslie told her something about that…" Noelle's voice trailed off when she realized Brianna's attention was engaged elsewhere. "What's the matter with you?"

"Look at that guy over there!" Brianna breathed, staring avidly. "What a hottie!"

"Who?" Noelle prodded, frowning. Brianna had never really had a boyfriend, but over the past year or two Noelle had gotten used to her friend's intense, though brief, crushes.

"The guy in the red baseball jersey with the white number 25 on it," Brianna said, pointing. Noelle searched for a moment to locate Brianna's quarry and shook her head, and Brianna got impatient enough to grab Noelle's head and turn it in the correct direction. "Not over there, silly, over that way."

A knot of boys hung out by the fence that separated the Ichinos' backyard from that of the house on the next street over, and the one in the red shirt laughed at something, leaning forward just enough for Noelle to recognize him. She froze, aghast. "Him?"

"Yeah! I mean, c'mon, Noelle, just look at him! What a face!"

"_Him?"_ Noelle blurted again, horrified. "That's my _stepbrother!_ Are you totally out of your _mind_, Brianna?"

Brianna spun on her behind in her chair to gawk at Noelle with delighted saucer eyes. "Really? Omigod, you lucky thing, you! Then you can introduce me to him!" Noelle's expression of repulsion finally registered with her, and her mouth dropped open in disbelief. "Oh, come on, Noelle, he isn't even related to you. It's not like I've got a crush on Alexander or anything."

Noelle groaned. "Now _that'd_ be revolting. Bad enough you've got your eye on my stepbrother. Geez, Brianna, he doesn't even live here, he lives in Hawaii with my dad."

"So what? That doesn't change the fact that he's _so_…_totally_…_hot."_ Brianna's gaze zoomed back to her target. "That's absolutely the best-looking guy I've seen in, like, forever. Noelle, c'mon, do it for me—for your BFF, okay?"

Noelle sighed and reluctantly got to her feet before Brianna, already standing, could tear off for the fence alone and make a complete moron of herself. _At least it isn't that bully Ephraim,_ she consoled herself. She had been relieved beyond measure when she'd heard from her father and stepmother that Ephraim had been caught shoplifting and had been grounded till they all returned to Hawaii. Even Alexander still had hard feelings, and he didn't even play anymore with the toy cars Ephraim had taken all those years back. "Okay, come with me," she said and started off toward the boys.

Alexander and Aaron were over there along with David Omamara and another boy Noelle and Brianna didn't know; they paused in the middle of some conversation when the two girls approached. "What're you doing over here?" Alexander asked.

"Hi, Noelle," Aaron said, always friendly to everyone.

"Hi, Aaron," Noelle said, feeling vaguely less repulsed by the thought of Brianna's abrupt crush on him. He really was a nice guy, she decided; she just didn't know him very well, that was all. "How's it going?"

"Pretty good," Aaron said, glancing at Brianna, then smiling in the same friendly way he smiled at everyone. "Who's your friend?"

While Brianna gaped stupidly, stars in her eyes, Noelle repressed another sigh and said dutifully, "This is my best friend, Brianna Harding. Bri, this is my stepbrother, Aaron Crocker. He's fifteen."

"Hi, Aaron," Brianna said breathlessly. Alexander, David and the other boy looked at one another with that look on their faces that said they realized Brianna was hung up on Aaron, and planned to take full advantage of this knowledge.

"Hi, Brianna," Aaron said. "Nice to meet you. You go to school here?"

Brianna nodded, clearly thrilled beyond description that this latest boy of her dreams was so willing to talk to her. "Yeah, we're starting eighth grade soon. Noelle and I have been best friends since we were babies, so we've known each other, like, forever. She said you don't live on Fantasy Island. So I guess you live in Hawaii, huh?"

"Yeah," said Aaron, an amused glint in his eye that didn't escape Noelle. "We don't come over here too often…Noelle's dad works a lot."

"That sucks," Brianna commented, sounding as though this were on a par with the imminent takeover of the world by the Taliban. "Wow, Aaron, it's really so cool to meet you. Noelle doesn't know how lucky she is."

David, Alexander and the other boy snickered; Aaron easily ignored them, his attention on Brianna. "Yeah, well, Noelle and I don't know each other too well, you know. So you must be, what, thirteen?"

"I'll be fourteen next April," Brianna immediately pointed out. Unnoticed, Noelle rolled her eyes. Aaron smiled.

"That's cool," he said.

Alexander cleared his throat loudly. "Hey, you guys, why don't you go off someplace and help in the kitchen or something?"

"You Neanderthal," Noelle said disgustedly.

"Actually, that's where my sister is," said the other boy, catching Brianna's attention as well as Noelle's. "You can go in there and drag her out if you want."

"Your sister?" Brianna asked blankly.

Desperate to get her friend away from the boys, Noelle said immediately, "Yeah, come on, Brianna, let's go find her. What's her name?"

"Dori," he said. "Just head for the kitchen, she's probably in there with my grandmother or somebody." Noelle nodded, grabbed Brianna's arm and towed her away, trying to hide her annoyance at Brianna's insistence on waggling her fingers at Aaron.

It was a relief when they reached the kitchen and Brianna hadn't complained about Noelle's making her leave Aaron. At first it looked as though no one was there, but then the girls heard voices somewhere else in the house, and at the same time noticed the scent of ripe fruit in the air. "Wow, smells good," Brianna remarked.

Her voice elicited a gasp that made the girls turn to look for its source, at the same time said source spun around from the counter. They all stared at one another before Noelle thought to ask, "Are you Dori?"

The dark-haired girl at the sink nodded. "Dori Ichino."

Brianna and Noelle looked at each other. "You're an Ichino?" Brianna asked. "Then how come we've never seen you before?"

"I live in Hawaii," Dori explained. "My dad owns a software company there." She read their blank looks and elaborated, "My dad's Tom Ichino."

Brianna and Noelle still weren't sure whom she was talking about, but they decided not to bother pursuing it. "How come you're in here and not outside?" Brianna asked.

"I'm making the fruit salad for the cookout," Dori said. "I always make fruit salad for cookouts. I guess you could call it my specialty."

Brianna and Noelle drifted closer to take a look at the four huge bowls sitting on the counter, the piles of apples, oranges, mangos, pineapple, papaya, grapes and various other fruits that were either being cut, waiting to be cut, or sitting in heaps of cubes. "All by yourself?" Noelle finally asked in amazement. "Geez, doesn't anybody ever help you out?"

Dori looked astonished. "No, never. Like I said, it's my specialty."

Brianna snorted. "For fifty people? Come on, Noelle, let's help. We could get it done a lot faster with three of us."

Dori blinked, as if completely stunned by some unexpected new development in a crime story she'd been reading. "I…um…I don't really mind doing it alone…"

"But it's not fair," Noelle protested. "We can help. Give us each a knife and we'll all have it done in no time flat."

Dori opened her mouth but said nothing, still looking shocked; and it was then that Camille, Michiko and Leslie came into the room and stopped in surprise. "Looks like you've got some helpers," Camille remarked.

Dori turned a startling shade of crimson. "Um…yeah, I guess so."

"We'll help, if someone just shows us where to find knives," Brianna offered.

"That drawer over there beside the fridge," Camille said, pointing to it. Brianna got the knives and handed Noelle one of them, and pretty soon the three girls were cutting up fruit, while Brianna and Noelle chatted and asked Dori questions. Camille grinned and gestured Michiko and Leslie out to the backyard.

"She's cute," Michiko said. "Whose is she?"

"That's my niece, Tommy's daughter Dori," Camille explained.

"Cute name," Leslie offered.

"It's short for Dorothea, which the poor kid just plain loathes," Camille said with another grin towards the house, this one sympathetic. "She's the same age as Brianna and Noelle, but she's incredibly shy. Tommy and Susan get worried about her sometimes. She actually volunteered to hide away in the kitchen and make her famous fruit salad, all by herself, for this entire crowd—probably so she wouldn't have to face new people."

"It's too bad they don't live here on the island," Michiko remarked. "Dori'd have two new friends right away; and even if she was too shy to make more friends on her own, either Brianna and Noelle would draw her into their group, or she'd be just as happy with only the two of them for friends."

Camille shrugged. "I've thought of that too, but I don't see Tommy and Susan leaving Hawaii. After all, Tommy's got that lucrative business of his—which employs your brother, don't forget, Michiko—and Susan's got some tenure at the local real-estate office, so they're not going anywhere. I've told Tommy I wouldn't mind having Dori live with us, if he and Susan think she needs pulling out of her shell, but they never say anything about it no matter how much I nag them."

"You could corner them and talk to them about it again," Leslie suggested facetiously. "Of course, that depends on whether Dori is amenable to the idea at all."

"Yeah, I know." Camille shrugged again. "But I think the poor girl's going to get flattened when she starts high school, and in the future she might remember it as the worst time of her life."

Leslie smiled. "Well, you can't speculate on stuff like that. If Dori and Brianna and Noelle get close enough while they're here, at least she'll have a couple of e-mail friends here. And she can get together with them whenever they visit the island."

"That's better than nothing at all," Michiko agreed, and Camille nodded. The conversation stopped there, as by now they had made their way into the midst of the colossal crowd that had taken over the Ichinos' backyard, and there were any number of people who wanted to draw the three friends into groups. In the end it was Maureen, Tabitha, Katsumi and Myeko who succeeded in roping them in.

"There you are. We were wondering what happened to you," Myeko said. "Not only that, but whether Hachiro really did bring all his kids."

"Thought you'd know that, being his ex and all," Camille twitted her.

Myeko rolled her eyes. "He's got too many to keep track of, and anyway, it's not my job to try to remember exactly how many he has."

"He brought everybody except Ephraim," Michiko volunteered, pulling up a lawn chair and settling into it. Maureen handed her a dripping water bottle and she accepted it with a smile. "Thanks, Maureen."

"You're welcome. Why'd he leave out Ephraim?" Maureen inquired, extracting two bottles of soda from a nearby cooler and handing one to Camille and the other to Leslie.

"They grounded him. He was caught shoplifting at the grocery store earlier this month, and they restricted him to the house for the rest of their stay here. That included all family excursions, so he's under my mother's supervision while the rest of us came here."

The girls looked at one another and blinked; Myeko whistled low. "I didn't hear about that. I mean, of course, they'd want to keep it private, but still…"

Michiko sighed. "I just hope my mother survives the day. And it's not as if that's all I have to deal with." She gave the others a brief account of the story she had told Leslie about her worries over Errico.

"That isn't right," Tabitha remarked, frowning. "As Errico's wife, you have every right to be kept informed of what's happening. It almost sounds to me as if you might have to go back to Arcolos prematurely and surprise them. They need to tell you the truth."

"Arcolos is still a very patriarchal society," Michiko said, "and believe me, if you don't think I find that annoying—not to mention exhausting…"

"I just bet," Maureen agreed, and the others nodded.

"So I sometimes get the feeling that Paolono and Marcolo are keeping the full truth from me because they think that, as a woman, I'm too weak to handle it. I finally e-mailed Errico from here—Leslie suggested it—I just haven't been able to think, between worrying about Errico and living with the constant tension in Mother's house. I was lucky enough to catch him online—"

"At two or three in the morning?" broke in Myeko, amazed.

"He has insomnia, atop everything else. He told me so after I sent him my message and my cell phone rang within five minutes. Not only that, he thought it was best to contact me directly while the rest of the castle was asleep and his sons couldn't interfere. He says they're still waiting for the biopsy results, but he personally isn't very optimistic, and he told me his instincts are never wrong. I hope for once that's only an empty boast."

Her friends looked at one another, at a loss for words; finally Katsumi ventured, "It is so difficult for you, yes? You want to return to be there for him, I can see that."

Michiko nodded. "But Paolono insisted I stay here and finish my vacation—which is stupid, isn't it? I mean, like I said to Leslie, it's almost over anyway; what difference would a week make? I think they're hiding something from me. Or I did, anyway, till Errico called and told me that so far they just don't know anything. He did mention that he'd like to have me back home, no matter what the boys might say. When he found out I was here with all of you and everyone's families, he said to stay and wait till tomorrow to start the trip back. He didn't want me missing out on time with my friends."

"Awww," Myeko said with a grin. "Now that's a peach of a guy, isn't it? Who knows, maybe by the time you and Cat get back to Santi Arcuros, they'll have the results back and you'll find out there was nothing to worry about all along. Maybe Errico can't think positive, but there's no reason _you_ can't."

"She's right," Tabitha said. "Don't spoil the last of your time here by thinking such dark thoughts. Let yourself relax, or else you'll be so tense that by the time you get back, you'll be twice as tired from the flights as you normally would be."

Michiko nodded slowly. "I guess that makes sense. I'll have plenty to occupy me when we do get back, and not just Errico's diagnosis. Paolono's wedding has to be arranged, and that's going to be a killer. His fiancée is a sweetheart—she's a commoner from Ionici, and worked as an assistant to her father, who runs a little travel agency there. She's a shy little thing, but she's been coming out of her shell a little bit since she and Paolono met back in February and started dating. She's really captured the hearts of the Arcolosians, and they totally approve of her marrying their crown prince. So Errico is very much relieved that his son finally found a decent woman and had the sense to fall in love with her and make her his wife—those are his words."

"He better not have said something stupid about how he can die happy now," said Camille with disgust, rolling her eyes.

"As a matter of fact, he did," Michiko informed her, nodding at Camille's outraged look. "I told him to stop spouting that kind of garbage because I wasn't listening to it. I also warned him that if he says anything in front of Cat that she doesn't need to hear, he'll have absolute hell to pay for it. You should have heard how meek he got after that."

Her friends laughed, which finally made her smile; and they all took sips of their drinks before finding a new conversational topic. At one point someone asked Leslie where Christian had vanished to, and she admitted that the last she'd seen of him, he had been hanging out with the guys at the grill. "Get outta here," Camille scoffed.

"He does cook," Leslie informed her. "Just because you've never eaten anything he's made, doesn't mean he can't do it. And he happens to be good at it, too."

"A prince who cooks. Sounds like an oxymoron," Myeko said, and that brought on such merriment that some people nearby wanted to know what the joke was.

Shortly after that, the food was pronounced to be ready, and it took a full half hour for the entire crowd to get their plates filled and find seats along the ten rented picnic tables. Christian managed to find a space near Leslie and saved just enough room for the triplets to sit, so that their parents could supervise them. They were surrounded by friends, since Maureen and Grady were sitting nearby with Brianna and April, and Myeko and Nick had Noelle and Dawn with them. Alexander, who had eschewed his family in favor of the few other boys his age in attendance, had been replaced by none other than Dori Ichino, whose parents were a few feet away, across from Camille, Jimmy and Robin.

Tommy eventually introduced his wife Susan to Christian and Leslie, and when he began to explain who Dori was, Leslie said, "I know, she's your daughter. I met her a while ago in the kitchen. She did such a good job on this fruit salad, I'm probably getting more."

"You made dat?" Karina asked, fixing on Dori, who nodded with enormous surprise. Karina beamed. "Dat's yummy! I'm asking Mommy for more."

"Thanks," murmured Dori, blushing but obviously pleased.

"I like it too," volunteered Susanna. "Hope you got lots more."

"Me too," piped up Tobias. " 'Cept I don't like dis stuff." He held up a chunk of pear in front of Leslie. "Mommy, you an' Daddy can eat dis stuff." Everyone around them laughed when Leslie groaned and blushed, and Dori giggled.

"It's okay, Mrs. Enstad," she said. "Little kids are picky, I know."

Leslie grinned, noticing Tommy and Susan exchange astonished looks. "Yes, they can be, all right. Actually, it's not too often that these three get choosy, but pears just happen to be one of the few things Tobias won't eat."

"See, told ya it'd be a big hit," Brianna spoke up smugly from Maureen's far side, addressing Dori.

Dori grinned sheepishly. "I guess so."

It was this episode that, some little time later, made Susan Ichino approach Leslie, a little trepidation in her eyes. "Excuse me, Mrs. Enstad…you're my sister-in-law's friend, right?" When Leslie nodded, she said, "I thought I'd ask you something. This might seem a little presumptuous, but I…well, I saw the way your children talked to my daughter." She cleared her throat, her face reddening. "Dori's very, very shy. She has no friends either at school or in our neighborhood, and Tommy and I have talked about it, but we just don't know what we can do. After all, we both have our jobs and we're very busy, and we don't have a lot of spare time."

Leslie said a little hesitantly, "Camille mentioned talking to you about moving back here, or at least allowing Dori to."

Susan nodded. "Well, we weren't sure. It just sounded as if Camille was making a big deal out of a small problem. But this morning my mother-in-law said something about being worried over Dori's reaction to all the people here—she thinks Dori's shyness is more of a people phobia, if you see what I mean. Anyway…well, Tommy and I discussed it a little. We were so astounded that Dori opened up this much in just one day—after meeting those other girls her age, and then having your children talk spontaneously to her and compliment her on her fruit salad, and her responding to you. We're seriously considering asking Tommy's parents to let Dori live with them, for at least this school year, so Dori can attend middle school here. If it works out well for her, we'll see if we can arrange to have her stay and go on to high school here. I was secretly terrified for Dori's future in high school. I was just as shy as she was, and I was endlessly bullied all the way through high school for being such a mouse. I don't want Dori going through the same thing. So I'm going to see if his parents will let her stay with them and go to school here."

"It sounds like it would be a wonderful thing for her," Leslie agreed with a smile. "Camille admitted to being worried for her too, so she'll be glad to hear this."

"I'm planning to tell the family a little later. But in the meantime…I thought that maybe, if this works out and you and your husband ever need a babysitter for any reason, you'd consider hiring Dori. I think the experience would be good for her."

Leslie smiled. "Before I explain, don't take this as a refusal, please. We do have a live-in helper who does most of our housework and cooking, and she's been helping with the triplets since they were born. And when I'm working on the weekends, the daughter of a friend of ours watches them. But she's about to start her final year of high school, and she's already got her eye on several colleges she's thinking about going to. She may not always have the time to sit with the triplets. So if Dori does end up staying on the island, we'll be glad to consider having her watch the kids on weekends."

Susan beamed, looking deeply relieved. "That's such good news—thank you so much! I'm sure Camille will let you know what the final decision is, but that really makes me feel better about the idea of having Dori stay here. What's the first day of school here?"

"September fourth, the day after Labor Day. Fantasy Island schools don't have all the same holidays as American schools, so Dori won't have as many days off during the year; but she'll get out for the summer next May 30, so she has more summer vacation. If your in-laws agree to let her stay with them, there'll be plenty of time to get Dori settled and registered in school. Good luck, I hope it works."

"Me too." Susan looked much happier, Leslie thought. "We'll make sure Camille lets you know what happens. Thanks so much for considering Dori as a babysitter." She hurried off before Leslie could respond.

"What happened?" Christian asked, coming up behind her less than a minute later as she was watching Susan hunt down her husband and some of her in-laws among the crowd. "You look as if someone left you in the lurch."

Leslie grinned. "No, far from it. We may have a solution to the babysitter dilemma after Haruko leaves the island for college." She told him what had taken place.

"Well, that's good news, as long as things work out," Christian agreed. "Now suppose we rejoin the party? I think, now that everyone's eaten and had dessert, it'll probably start to break up pretty soon, and I for one am ready to get our imps back home and relax for an evening. And I'm sure I'm not the only one."

"Just as well. We should probably say goodbye to Michiko too. She's headed back to Arcolos in the morning with Cat, and this might be the last chance we have to see her." She led the way toward where she and her friends had been sitting earlier.


	7. Chapter 7

§ § § - August 20, 2007

It was dusk by the time Hachiro, Michiko, Lani and all the children trudged wearily through the front door of the Tokita house. "Mama-san?" Hachiro and Michiko called in near unison, made equally uneasy by the quiet that met them coming in.

"Come in here," they heard Miyoshi call out. "We are in kitchen."

Most of the boys groaned. "I'm too full to eat any more," Aaron grumbled.

"Yeah," three or four of his brothers agreed.

Miyoshi appeared in the kitchen doorway across from the top of the steps leading up from the foyer. "Is not heavy meal," she assured them, taking in their doubtful faces. "How long since you had meal with Paul and Katie?"

"Only two or three hours," Michiko said. "It was one of those late-afternoon cookouts that almost becomes supper. I didn't eat that much, though. I don't like gorging myself and coming home feeling like my stomach's going to burst."

Lani was nodding as she spoke. "I'm with you. Besides, I get acid reflux all the time, and I have to be careful of what I eat, or it keeps me awake all night."

"I'm hungry," announced Tyler, almost three, which made Lani roll her eyes.

"You're a human vacuum cleaner," she said. "He's never _not_ hungry. Whatever you have in there, I hope it's something he likes."

"He like this," Miyoshi assured her. "Come in kitchen, Tyler, I show you what your brother make for us all."

"My brother who?" Liam asked blankly. "We were all at the cookout."

Cody elbowed him. "Not Ephraim, remember?"

Liam's expression curdled. "Oh yeah. If Ephraim made it, I don't want any."

"Yeah, he'd prob'ly try to poison us," Zachary opined.

Michiko cleared her throat. "Guys, guys," she admonished. "Give it a chance. Let's go see what he's got in there."

"He make it himself," Miyoshi said with a broad smile. "I give him recipe and all things that go in it, and he does everything. We have some before you come home. He will be very good cook, your boy."

Hachiro and Lani looked at each other in astonishment; even the boys were curious enough to crowd into the kitchen along with the adults. Ephraim sat alone at the table, a huge wooden bowl filled with what appeared to be salad in front of him and stacks of salad bowls, forks and napkins nearby. If he had heard his younger brothers' disparaging remarks, he gave no sign. "Hi," he said.

"Hi, son," Lani greeted him. "Is that salad?"

Ephraim nodded. "It's kind of a 'garbage salad.' I called it that 'cause it's got everything on earth in it. Lettuce, tomatoes, bell peppers in three colors, cucumbers, shredded lettuce and red cabbage, sliced radishes, _shiso_ and basil leaves, and a special dressing Miyoshi showed me how to make. Everybody can eat it—even you, Mom."

"Even me? With my acid reflux?" Lani asked. Ephraim nodded, and she surveyed the bowl with mounting interest. "And you did that whole thing entirely by yourself?"

"Whole thing is Ephraim's," Miyoshi confirmed. "I give him basic recipe and he make it all his own. I already have a little and it tastes wonderful. You must try it."

The younger boys looked dubiously on while the adults dished out bowls of salad and Aaron added a couple of spoonfuls to a bowl of his own, no doubt to be polite, the way he was to everyone. But within seconds, they were all astounded by the taste. "This is fantastic, Eph!" Lani exclaimed, delighted. "The flavors are delectable!"

"Mmmph, it really is good," Hachiro agreed through a mouthful. He swallowed and regarded the contents of his bowl, then Ephraim, who looked uncharacteristically serene. "I gotta hand it to you, this is as good as anything I could eat in a fancy restaurant."

"Very tasty," Michiko put in. "And it's just right for an evening meal after that enormous amount of food we had at the Ichinos'."

"You did good, bro," Aaron said and grinned. "I mean, I thought my stomach couldn't hold any more, but this actually makes me hungry."

Ephraim's grin by now had consumed half his face, and his eyes were shining. "So you guys really like it?"

"We love it," Lani assured him, setting her bowl down long enough to wrap her arms around his shoulders and squeeze.

Ephraim popped out of his chair while Aaron helped himself to a couple more scoops of the salad. "You know what, Miyoshi said everybody's good at something. I made another recipe for supper, for me and her, before I did the salad. She let me use her rice cooker to make a casserole with rice and salmon and a bunch of vegetables in it…"

"Which veggies?" Michiko broke in. "It sounds familiar; I think it's the one that we all grew up eating."

"She told me the name in Japanese, but I can't remember it. Anyway, it's got mushrooms and potatoes, corn, peas and some seaweed in it. All she did was give me the recipe and I followed it on my own. I wasn't sure I could do it, and she had to help me set the rice cooker, but everything else, I did myself."

Hachiro was grinning; Ephraim's excitement was contagious. "I know what you're describing. It's called _takikomi gohan_. Michiko's right; we grew up eating that, had it at least once a week for supper. So there must have been plenty left over—it makes a lot."

"Yeah, Miyoshi said we could have the rest for lunch tomorrow," Ephraim said. "You know what? She's giving me a cookbook I can take home and make recipes from. It's really fun, finding the right ingredients and making something that tastes good. If you don't mind, Mom, maybe at home I could do some of the cooking."

"That would be a great idea," Michiko said, reading Lani's flabbergasted look and grinning. "Japanese food is very good for you—very healthful. Now, if you have plenty of the food we grew up on, your whole family will benefit. And it tastes good, too. Get the younger kids started on it now, when their palates are still open to new things, and you'll have some converts on your hands. Sooner or later the older ones will want to get in on it too, just to keep from being left out."

"I dunno," Cody said, peering doubtfully at the salad. "That smells funny."

"That's because you don't have a refined palate, like the rest of us," Aaron twitted him with a smirk, ruffling his hair and making him duck away. "And you know, Hachiro, if you eat this kind of food, and you spend more time practicing baseball with the twerps, next thing you know you could lose forty pounds and look ten years younger."

"Get this! Advice from my know-it-all stepson!" Hachiro said, laughing.

"It's true," Michiko said. "Not only that, but you could lay off all that nice imported Japanese beer you have such a taste for, and that'd help too."

Hachiro lifted both hands into the air. "I surrender. So you've got the magic solution for the spare tire. Now how about the bald spot?"

"I can cook for you, Hachiro, but I can't work miracles," Ephraim said, and everyone burst into laughter. Even the younger boys took experimental bites of Ephraim's salad after that, and once it was pronounced good (with only one dissenting vote from Griffen), they all took seats where they could find them and dug in. For the first time, Lani and Hachiro dared begin to hope that they could get the boy back on the right track.

§ § § - August 30, 2007

"Hey, Leslie! What're you doing in here? I thought you were working today," called out Camille, much to the surprise of Leslie, who was in the island's one and only supermarket picking up some last-minute snacks for the triplets, herself and Christian for later.

She laughed and waited for Camille to catch up, pushing her cart at nearly breakneck speed. "Just grabbing some stuff for us later. It'll be a long afternoon and Mariki warned us that supper'll be late because she has to wait for some things to come in from Hawaii that she ran out of. So what's up?"

"Not too much, just surprised to see you in here, that's all. Oh, no, wait a minute, there _is_ something. Almost forgot. I talked to my mother last evening and she and Dad have worked everything out with Tommy and Susan for Dori to move in with them and start school here next Tuesday. Susan's taking tomorrow off and bringing Dori to the island, and they're bringing along as much of her stuff as possible and shipping a bunch of other things. According to secondhand accounts, Dori's really excited about going to school for the first time Susan can remember, because she's already got Maureen's and Myeko's girls for friends. Everybody's excited. They think it'll be good for her."

"Hey, that _is_ great news. I'm glad for Dori especially. Nobody should have to endure high school without friends." Leslie's smile wilted. "I'm glad you had something positive to tell me, because I got a phone call from Michiko this morning just before I came over here. It turns out that Errico does have cancer after all."

"Oh wow," groaned Camille, her face radiating sympathy. "That's a major bummer, all right. What's the plan for treating it?"

"Well, they can't really operate on the mass they found, because it's pretty deep in Errico's brain and they don't want to risk turning him into a vegetable even if they get it all out. So they're going with chemotherapy and see if that does anything to it. Actually, when Michiko told me that, she sounded a little better than she did when she was here. She said it's just such a relief to know what the problem is and what's going to be done about it, and then she added that Errico's furious because he's afraid he might not be well enough to see Paolono get married."

Camille laughed. "Sounds like Errico. Well, I'll e-mail Michiko tonight and pass on my best wishes, and I'll give the other girls a heads-up for you if you want."

"Already did that—in fact you'll find an e-mail when you get home. Michiko said they're releasing a formal statement to the press later today, which is actually tomorrow for them, so we've got the scoop. She even mentioned she gave Myeko permission to put the news in her column for the _Fantasy Island Chronicle."_

Camille nodded and glanced into her cart, then rolled her eyes. "Crud, I forgot the dog food. Well, hey, we'll talk again soon, I'm sure…just wanted to touch base. Don't want to keep you from anything important."

"No problem," Leslie assured her. "See you later." She watched Camille round the corner and disappear toward the next aisle, then headed slowly for the checkout with her basket, letting her thoughts drift along to Michiko's other news: that Ephraim's cooking adventures at home were turning out to be a surprising success, and that he now wanted to go to cooking school as an aspiring chef. Wishing Hachiro and Lani further success in repairing their relationship with each other and Ephraim—and not even realizing how unusual that would have been for her not so long ago—she turned her thoughts to the upcoming weekend and her own workload, which had increased slightly thanks to Roarke's preparations for something mysterious and a bit sinister-sounding. She knew she'd find out sooner or later; it was only a matter of being patient.

* * *

><p><em>Speaking of being patient, I really appreciate that my readers have (if I have any left, that is)… With my stepsons on Christmas vacation, I'll give myself a break till the new year and then, I hope, come back sometime in January with something new. Whatever you celebrate, have a wonderful holiday; if you don't celebrate any of the "traditional" holidays, happy winter solstice! See you next year!<em>


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